JPH089910A - Method for drying wet noodle and device therefor - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To enable to rapidly dry wet noodles without deteriorating the quality. CONSTITUTION:In a heating device 3, wet noodles 2 are supported on the supporter 5 of a conveyer device 4 for heating the noodles and simultaneously carried into a hot air-circulating oven 7. In the hot air-circulating oven 7, hot air is forcibly circulated from the upper part to the lower part. Thus, the hot air is downward flowed through vent holes penetrated in the supporter 5, thereby efficiently heating the wet noodles 2. In a subsequent cooling device 9, the heated noodle is supported on the supporter 11 of a conveyer 10 for cooling the heated noodles and simultaneously carried into a cold air-circulating oven 13. In the cold air-circulating oven, cold air is also forcibly circulated from the upper part to the lower part. Thus, the cold air is downward flowed through vent holes penetrated in the supporter 11, thereby efficiently cooling the heated noodles.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a method and apparatus for drying wet noodles.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art As is well known, noodles such as rice noodles are transferred from the previous step in the final step of the manufacturing process, for example, wet noodles having a moisture content of 50% are dried to a moisture content of 10%. Manufactured.

At this time, generally, the supporting tools supporting the wet noodles are successively transferred to a hot air circulating furnace, the atmosphere near the supporting tools is kept in a hot air retention state and heated to a predetermined temperature, and then left outside the furnace. Cooling, ie cooling slowly. This is because if it is cooled rapidly, cracks or the like will occur, which is not preferable for quality control.

[0004]

Therefore, in such a drying step, a relatively long processing time is required and the productivity is not sufficient. Therefore, for example, Japanese Patent Publication No. 62-30
As disclosed in Japanese Laid-Open Patent Publication No. 743, it has been attempted to bring it into contact with warm air of about 40 ° C. to cool it, but none of them has been satisfactory.

In view of the above drawbacks, the present invention has conducted intensive studies to solve the above drawbacks. As a result, the wet noodles are heated by being brought into contact with hot air flow while tact transfer using a porous support. It was found that the noodles heated by heating (heated noodles) can be dried more rapidly without deteriorating the quality by transferring the noodles with a porous support and cooling the noodles while contacting them with cold air flow. is there.

[0006]

[Means for Solving the Problems] That is, a method for drying wet noodles according to the present invention is one in which a supporting device supporting wet noodles is sequentially transferred to a heating device to heat heated noodles from the supporting device. In a method for drying wet noodles, which is transferred to a support, and then sequentially transferred to a cooling device to cool the support that supports the heated noodles, in the heating device, the wet noodles are added to the support. In the cooling device as described above, the heating device is brought into contact with hot air circulated through a vent hole that is penetrated to heat the air.
It is characterized in that the heated noodles are cooled by bringing them into contact with cold air that is circulated through the ventilation holes that penetrate the other supporting tools. The hot air is 80 to 120 ° C, the cold air is 95% RH or more, and 5 to 20 ° C.
Is preferred.

Further, the apparatus for drying wet noodles according to the present invention is equipped with a heating conveyor in which a support for supporting the wet noodles is mounted so that the tact circulation can be successively transferred from the inlet side to the outlet side of the hot air circulation furnace. A heating device provided with a device, a cooling device provided with a cooling conveyor device which is mounted so as to be able to circulate and transfer the support for supporting the heated noodles from the inlet side to the outlet side of the cold air circulation furnace one after another, Drying device for wet noodles configured with a cargo handling device that transfers heated noodles from the support of the heating conveyor device to the support of the cooling conveyor device between the outlet of the hot air circulation furnace and the inlet of the cold air circulation furnace In the above, the hot-air circulation furnace is configured so that hot air can be circulated through a vent hole that is penetrated through the support for supporting the wet noodles, and the cold-air circulation furnace is a support for storing the heated noodles. Vented through It is characterized in that it has configured to be able to circulate cold air through the.

The support for supporting the wet noodles is composed of a tray body having ventilation holes penetrating through the bottom wall thereof, and the support for supporting the heated noodles is composed of a plate-like body having ventilation holes penetrating therethrough. Is preferred.

[0009]

In FIG. 1, the wet noodles 2 to be dried are successively transferred from the previous step by the conveyor 1 and supplied to the heating conveyor device 4 of the heating device 3. that time,
The wet noodles 2 are stored in the support 5 of the heating conveyor device 4. The support 5 is composed of a tray body having a bottom wall having a vent hole 6 penetrating therethrough (see FIGS. 4 and 5).

The wet noodles 2 stored in the support 5 are
The hot air circulating furnace 7 is tact-transferred and heated, but the hot air circulating furnace 7 forcibly circulates the hot air from the upper side to the lower side (see FIG. 2). Therefore, such hot air flows downward through the ventilation holes 6 penetrating the support 5, and the wet noodles 2 are effectively heated.

Subsequently, the heated noodles that have been heated to a predetermined temperature and transferred to the outside of the hot air circulation furnace 7 are loaded with a cargo handling device 45 (see FIG. 7,
8), it is transferred from the support tool 5 of the heating conveyor device 4 to the cooling conveyor device 10 of the cooling device 9, that is, is supported by the support tool 11 of the cooling conveyor device 10. In addition, the support tool 11 is configured by a flat plate-shaped body having the ventilation hole 12 penetrating therethrough (see FIG. 8).

Then, the heated noodles supported by the support 11 are transferred into the cold air circulation furnace 13 and cooled. In addition,
The cold air circulating furnace 13 is forcedly circulated (see FIG. 9) so as to generate a cold air flow from the upper side to the lower side.

Therefore, the cold air flows downward through the ventilation holes 12 penetrating the support tool 11, and the heated noodles are effectively cooled. In this way, the heating of the wet noodles 2 and the subsequent cooling of the heated noodles can be carried out in contact with the flow-through atmosphere, so that the drying can be performed more rapidly without degrading the quality.

[0014]

EXAMPLE An example of the present invention will be described below. In FIG. 1, a heating device 3 is composed of a heating conveyor device 4 and a hot air circulating furnace 7, and a cooling device 9 is
It is composed of a cooling conveyor device 10 and a cold air circulation furnace 13.

First, the hot air circulating furnace 7 of the heating device 3 will be described. The furnace 7 is installed at the left side in the furnace body 15 as shown in FIG. 2 which is a vertical sectional view. A circulating fan 16, a plate fin type vapor heater 17 mounted above it, an exhaust duct 19 having one end connected to an opening 18 in the ceiling wall of the furnace body 15,
An exhaust fan 20 connected to the other end of the duct 19 and mounted on the ceiling wall of the furnace body 15 and a motor 21 similarly mounted on the ceiling wall of the furnace body 15 are provided.

The motor 21 and the circulation fan 16 are
It is linked by a V-belt type winding transmission means 22. Further, one end of the suction duct 23 is connected to the suction port 24 of the circulation fan 16, and the other end is connected to the furnace body 15
It is connected to the intake duct 25 attached to the.

Therefore, by starting the motor 21 and rotating the circulation fan 16, the hot air can be circulated from the upper side to the lower side as shown by the arrow in the drawing. At that time, the steam heater 17 is used. Is rectified in a predetermined direction by a perforated baffle plate 26 that is located on the right side of the inside of the furnace body 15 and outside air is sucked from the intake duct 25. In addition, by rotating the exhaust fan 20, it is possible to exhaust to the outside of the furnace body 15 as shown by the arrow in the figure.

Although one section constituting the hot-air circulation furnace 7 has been described above, the hot-air circulation furnace 7 is composed of 13 sections by connecting such sections to each other. The supply and discharge of steam to and from the steam heater 17 are performed via the supply pipe 27 and the discharge pipe 28.

The hot air is controlled at 80 ° C to 120 ° C. This is because at 80 ° C. or lower, the time required to heat the wet noodles to a predetermined extent becomes long and a long furnace (large furnace) is required. Also, at 120 ° C. or higher, the noodles may be burnt.

Next, the heating conveyor device 4 of the heating device 3
2, the conveyor device 4 includes left and right endless link chains 30 and a support 5 having one end fixed to one endless link chain 30 and the other end fixed to the other endless chain 30.
And a driving device (not shown) for tact-feeding both endless link chains 30 together. The driving device is composed of a motor, a speed reducer, a chain-type winding transmission means, etc. Is disposed on the exit side, that is, on the chain wheel 31a side in FIG.

The drive-side pair of sheaves 31a (the sheaves mounted in the front-rear direction in FIG. 1) are mounted coaxially (drive shaft), and the driven-side pair of sheaves 31a.
b is also mounted coaxially (driven shaft). Also, the furnace body 1
5 is composed of an inner frame structure 33 and an outer heat insulating plate 34 attached to the inner frame structure 33. One of the left and right guide rails 35a is horizontally and vertically attached to the frame structure 33. While the endless link chain 30 is guided, the other endless link chain 30 is also guided by the right and left vertically mounted guide rails 35b. The lower guide rail 3
5a and 35b are mounted below the suction duct 23.

In addition, as shown in FIG. 3 which is an enlarged view of the support tool 5, the L-shaped brackets 36 attached to both ends in the longitudinal direction of the support tool 5 are attached to the attachments 37 of both endless link chains 30. It is locked and bolted. Further, in FIG. 4 showing a longitudinal section in the longitudinal direction, and in FIG. 5 showing a longitudinal section in a direction (width direction) orthogonal to the longitudinal direction, the support 5 is It is composed of a tray body in which a plurality of partition plates 38 are mounted, and a large number of ventilation holes 6 are made to penetrate through the bottom wall of each storage compartment 39 formed thereby.

In this way, the support 5 composed of the rectangular tray body is mounted on both endless link chains 30 as close to each other as possible, that is,
The chain wheels 31a and 31b are mounted so as to be close to each other so as not to make it difficult to transfer at the U-turn location where they are mounted (see FIG. 6, which is a plan view).

Thus, the first conveyor device 4 causes the endless link chain 30 to be tact-fed by the driving device, so that the support 5 is tactile one after another from the inlet side to the outlet side of the hot air circulating furnace 7. It can be circulated. At that time, the hot air circulated is the frame structure 3 of the furnace body 15.
Left and right shield plates 40 attached to the 3 (see FIGS. 2 and 3)
This prevents the support tool 5 from flowing to the side of the transfer path, that is, to the left and right endless link chains 30 side,
Most of it passes through the ventilation hole 6 of the support 5 and flows into the suction duct 23.

Incidentally, as shown in FIG.
A gas seal means 41 is attached to the upper end of the suction duct 23, and a seal member 42 at the upper end of this means 41 is installed.
Is lightly contacted with the lower end of the L-shaped bracket 36 of the support 5 to be transferred. Therefore, hot air is prevented from flowing out to the left and right endless link chains 30 from here as well. In this way, most of the hot air from above is forcibly guided to the transfer path of the support tool 5, passed through the ventilation hole 6, and circulated.

Therefore, the wet noodles 5 stored in the respective storage compartments 39 of the support 5 can be brought into contact with the hot air flow to be heated quickly and in a predetermined manner. Also, wet noodles 5
Since the surface is not gradually heated, uneven heating is prevented and uniform heating can be achieved. In addition, the support 5 is formed of a tray body because hot air is stored in each storage compartment 3
This is because it is rectified so that it is forcibly led to 9.

The following is transferred in the furnace and heated to a predetermined level,
The heated noodles are successively transferred to the outside of the furnace through the outlet of the hot air circulating furnace 7. Then, by the cargo handling device 45 shown in FIG. 7 which is a front view and FIG. 8 which is a plan view of this diagram, the support 5 of the first conveyor device 4 is transferred to the cooling conveyor device 10 of the cooling device 9. Listed.

Although the cargo handling device 45 will be described later, the cooling conveyor device 10 of the cooling device 9 has the left and right endless link chains 46 as shown in FIG. 9 which is a vertical sectional view of the cold air circulating furnace 13. And a support 11 having one end fixed to one endless chain 46 and the other end fixed to the other endless chain 46.
And a drive device (not shown) that drives both endless link chains 46 together. The drive device is composed of a motor, a speed reducer, a chain-type winding transmission means, etc. It is arranged on the exit side, that is, on the chain wheel 48a side in FIG.

The pair of drive-side chain wheels 48a (the chain wheels mounted in the front-rear direction in FIG. 1) are mounted coaxially (drive shaft), and the pair of driven-side chain wheels 48a.
b is also mounted coaxially (driven shaft). Further, the furnace main body 49 of the cold air circulating furnace 7 is composed of an inner frame structure 50 and an outer wall plate 51 attached to the inner frame structure 50, and is horizontally and vertically attached to the frame structure 50. One endless link chain 46 is guided by the left guide rail 52a, and the other endless link chain 46 is similarly guided by the right guide rails 52b mounted horizontally and vertically. The lower guide rails 52a and 52b are mounted below the suction duct 54.

In this way, the cooling conveyor device 10 is
It is provided almost the same as the heating conveyor device 4. However, the support 11 has a large number of ventilation holes 12 over its entire length.
(See FIG. 8) It is configured by a flat plate-shaped body that penetrates through. In addition, the flat plate-like body here means a table-like body. Therefore, it is necessary to use not only a flat plate but also a shape in which a reinforcing rib is formed on the lower surface side opposite to the surface supporting the heated noodles, for example, a T-shaped cross section or a concave shape that is turned upside down. Although an appropriate one can be selected according to this embodiment, a flat plate-like body having a shape in which a concave shape is turned upside down is used in this embodiment. By using such a plate-shaped body, it is possible to facilitate the transfer of noodles as compared with the case where the above tray body is used.

On the other hand, in the cold air circulation furnace 13, the suction duct 54 connected to the suction port of the circulation fan 56 located outside the furnace, the outlet of the circulation fan 56, and a cold air generator not shown in the drawing. And an exhaust duct 57 connected to the cold air outlet of the cold air generator and the furnace body 49.
A cold air supply duct 58 connected to the opening of the ceiling wall of
A motor 59 for rotating the circulation fan 56 is provided, and the circulation fan 56 and the motor 59 are linked by a V-belt type winding transmission means.

Therefore, by activating the motor 59 and rotating the circulation fan 56, the cold air can be circulated from the upper side to the lower side as shown by the arrow in the drawing, but at that time, it is circulated. The left and right shield plates 60 mounted on the frame structure 50 of the furnace body 49 prevent the cool air from flowing to the side of the transfer path of the support tool 11, that is, the left and right endless link chains 46 side. Most of it passes through the ventilation hole 12 of the support tool 11 and the suction duct 5
4 is flowed in.

A gas sealing means 61 similar to the gas sealing means 41 of the hot air circulating furnace 7 is mounted on the upper end of the suction duct 54, and therefore, from here on as well.
Cold air is prevented from flowing out to the left and right endless link chains 46 side. In this way, most of the cool air from above is guided to the transfer path of the support tool 11, passed through the ventilation hole 12, and circulated. Therefore, the heated noodles placed on the support 11 can be brought into contact with the cold air flow to be cooled quickly and in a predetermined manner. At this time, since the surface of the heated noodles is not gradually cooled, uneven cooling is prevented from occurring and uniform cooling can be achieved.

The cold air is 95% RH or more, and
The temperature is controlled to 5 ° C. to 20 ° C., but is preferably controlled to 95% RH or more by ultrafine water droplets of 1 micrometer or less. This is because with water droplets of 1 micrometer or more, large water droplets are likely to be formed on the noodles, which makes it difficult to package immediately after cooling. Also, 95% R
This is because if it is less than H, it is difficult to sufficiently humidify the noodles, and if the noodles are packaged in an excessively dried state, the noodles are easily broken. Note that, although FIG. 9 shows a cross-sectional view of one section that constitutes the cold air circulation furnace 13, the cold air circulation furnace 13 is configured by two sections by connecting the sections to each other.

Next, the cargo handling device 45 will be described. In FIG. 7 which is a front view and FIG. 8 which is a plan view of this drawing, this device 45 is a pair of rails 67 mounted on the frames 65 and 66. Guided by both combo units 4, 1
A movable carriage 68 mounted so as to reciprocate in the extension direction of 0, and a pair of actuators 69 mounted on the movable carriage 68 at predetermined intervals in a direction orthogonal to the extension direction,
A bracket 70 attached to the tip ends of the piston rods of both actuators 69 and a noodle scooping robot 71 attached to the bracket 70 are provided. The noodle scooping robots 71 are mounted at the same pitch and in the same number as the storage compartment 39 group of the support 5.

Therefore, when the heated noodles are transferred to the cargo handling position by the tact feed of the heating combing device 4, the piston rods of the pair of actuators 69 are made to project, as shown in FIG.
As shown in 0, the noodle scooping robot 71
The forks 72 of each of the supports 5 in each storage compartment 39 of the support 5, and then the forks 72 of the supports 5 are swung toward each other as shown in FIG. The heated noodles in each storage compartment 39 can be scooped at the same time.

Then, after that, the pair of actuators 6
By immersing the piston rod of 9 and raising the hawk 72, the heated noodles can be transferred to the upper part of the storage compartment 39, and subsequently, the movable carriage 68 is moved by the cooling conveyor device 1.
When moved to the 0 side and stopped at a predetermined loading position for the cooling conveyor device 10, the forks 72 are rocked so as to move away from each other, and the heated noodles are dropped onto the support 11 of the cooling conveyor device 10. .

The dropping is performed from a height at which the heated noodles are not broken by the impact of dropping, and the cooling conveyor device 10 is constantly driven (or continuously driven). In addition, when the transfer of the heated noodles is completed in this way, the movable carriage 68 is immediately returned to the original cargo handling position on the heating-conveyor device 4. Hereinafter, since the tact feed of the heating combing device 4 and the return are synchronized, they can be transferred one after another through the same steps.

Although one embodiment has been described above, the cargo handling device 45 may be provided in a transfer mechanism of another type, and
The cooling conveyor device 10 may also be provided in a tact feed type, and any means may be used for removing the dried and cooled noodles transferred from the outlet of the cold air circulation furnace 13 from the cooling conveyor device 10. It may be. When it is necessary to continuously transfer to a subsequent process such as packaging, a suitable conveyor 80 (see FIG. 1) is provided, and it is suitable to transfer dried cooled noodles from the cooling conveyor device 10 to the conveyor 80 here. It is sufficient to install a cargo handling device. In addition, the support 5 may be made of a suitable material other than the tray-shaped body, and the support 11 may be made of a suitable material other than the flat-shaped body.

[0040]

As described above, according to the first to fourth aspects of the present invention, the wet noodles can be dried quickly without degrading the quality. According to the invention described in claim 2, quality deterioration during drying can be prevented more effectively, and according to the invention described in claim 4, the transfer of noodles can be carried out more quickly. You can

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a front view showing an overall configuration of a wet noodle drying device.

FIG. 2 is a vertical cross-sectional view of a heating device 3.

FIG. 3 is a support tool 5 for the endless link chain 30.
It is an enlarged view showing a mounting mode and the like.

FIG. 4 is a longitudinal cross-sectional view of a support 5 in a longitudinal direction.

5 is a left side view of FIG. 4. FIG.

FIG. 6 is a support tool 5 for the endless link chain 30.
It is a top view which expands and shows the mounting mode of.

7 is a front view of the cargo handling device 45. FIG.

FIG. 8 is a plan view of FIG.

9 is a vertical sectional view of the cooling device 9. FIG.

FIG. 10 is an enlarged view showing a state in which a hawk 72 of the noodle scooping robot 71 is positioned inside the storage compartment 39 of the support 5.

FIG. 11 is an enlarged view showing a state in which a hawk 72 of the noodle scooping robot 71 is closed.

[Explanation of symbols]

 2 Wet noodles 3 Heating device 4 Heating conveyor device 5 Supporting device 6 Vent hole 7 Hot air circulating furnace 9 Cooling device 10 Cooling conveyor device 11 Supporting device 12 Vent hole 13 Cold air circulating furnace 45 Cargo handling device

 ─────────────────────────────────────────────────── ─── Continuation of front page (72) Inventor Kenji Harada 1-1-1, Sonoyama, Otsu, Shiga Toray Engineering Co., Ltd. 7 Ken Min Food Co., Ltd. Sasayama Factory

Claims (4)

[Claims] 1. A support device that supports the wet noodles by sequentially transferring the heated noodles to a heating device and transferring the heated noodles to another support device, and then supporting the heated noodles. In the method for drying wet noodles by sequentially transferring and cooling to a cooling device, in the heating device, the wet noodles are brought into contact with hot air flow-through that is circulated through the ventilation holes penetrating the support. In addition to heating and in the cooling device,
A method for drying wet noodles, characterized in that the heated noodles are cooled by bringing them into contact with a cold air flow that is circulated through a ventilation hole that penetrates the other support. 2. The method for drying wet noodles according to claim 1, wherein the hot air is 80 to 120 ° C. and the cold air is 95.
% RH or more and 5 to 20 ° C, a method for drying wet noodles. 3. A heating device equipped with a heating conveyor device in which a supporting device for supporting wet noodles is mounted so as to be able to sequentially and cyclically transfer from the inlet side to the outlet side of the hot air circulation furnace,
A cooling device equipped with a cooling conveyor device which is mounted so as to circulate and transfer the support for supporting the heated noodles from the inlet side to the outlet side of the cold air circulation furnace, the outlet of the hot air circulation furnace and the cold air. In a dryer for wet noodles configured with a cargo handling device that transfers heated noodles to a support of the cooling conveyor device from a support of the heating conveyor device between the inlets of the circulation furnace, the hot air circulation furnace, The cold air circulating furnace is configured so that hot air can be circulated through the vents penetrating the support for supporting the wet noodles, and the cold air circulation furnace is passed through the vents penetrating the support for supporting the heated noodles. A device for drying wet noodles, characterized in that it is configured to circulate cold air. 4. The apparatus for drying wet noodles according to claim 3, wherein the support for supporting the wet noodles comprises a tray body having a ventilation hole penetrating the bottom wall and supports the heated noodles. A device for drying wet noodles, characterized in that the support member is formed of a flat plate-like member having a ventilation hole penetrating therethrough.