This work is titled construction and fabrication of an ice block making machine. Ice block making machine revolves around the concept of refrigeration. The concept of refrigeration revolves around the reverse Carnot cycle. This is a cycle involving isentropic expansion (at the throttling valve), isothermal expansion (at the evaporator), isentropic compression (at the compressor) and isothermal compressor ( at the condenser) Compression raises the temperatures of the refrigerant above that of its natural surrounding so that it can give up its heat in a heat exchanger to a heat sink such as air or water (condenser). Expansion lowers the refrigerant temperature below the temperature that is to be produced inside the cooling compartment.

CHAPTER ONE

1.0 INTRODUCTION

1.1 BACKGROUND OF THE PROJECT

1.2 AIM OF THE PROJECT

1.3 OBJECTIVE OF THE PROJECT

1.4 APPLICATION OF THE PROJECT

1.5 BENEFIT OF THE PROJECT

1.6 SIGNIFICANCE OF THE PROJECT

1.7 SCOPE OF THE PROJECT

1.8 LIMITATION OF THE PROJECT

1.9 STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM

1.10 PROJECT WORK ORGANISATION

CHAPTER TWO

2.0 LITERATURE REVIEW

2.1 REVIEW OF THE STUDY 

2.2 HISTORICAL BACKGROUND OF AN ICE MAKING MACHINE 

CHAPTER THREE

3.0     METHODOLOGY

3.1 CONSTRUCTION ANALYSIS AND CALCULATIONS

3.2      PRINCIPLE OF ICE MAKING

3.3 DETERMINATION AND CHOICE OF CONDENSER AND EVAPORATOR TEMPERATURES

3.4 COOLING LOAD CALCULATION

3.5 FLOW RATE CALCULATION

3.6 DETERMINATION OF COMPRESSOR SIZE

3.7 DETERMINATION OF CONDENSER CAPACITY

3.8 DETERMINATION OF PIPE SIZE AND LENGTH

CHAPTER FOUR

4.1 CONSTRUCTION DETAILS 

4.2 MATERIAL SELECTION

4.3 MATERIAL COMPATIBILITY 

4.4 SEQUENCE OF OPERATION  

4.5 PART OF HOUSING

4.6 DETAILS OF THE CONSTRUCTION

4.7 ASSEMBLY

4.8 COST ANALYSIS

4.9 CONDENSER MAINTENANCE

4.10 OTHER INSTRUCTIONS

4.11 COMMON COMPLAINTS, CAUSES AND REMENDY

CHAPTER FIVE

5.1 CONCLUSION

5.2 RECOMMENDATION

5.3 REFERENCES

CHAPTER ONE

1.0 INTRODUCTION

This project is on design and fabrication an ice block making machine. Ice has long been valued as a means of cooling. Ice is now produced on an industrial scale, for uses including food storage and processing, chemical manufacturing, concrete mixing and curing, and consumer or packaged ice. Ice is now produced on an industrial scale, for uses including food storage and processing, chemical manufacturing, concrete mixing and curing, and consumer or packaged ice. Ice production is a large business since 2002.For small-scale ice production, many modern home refrigerators can also make ice with a built in icemaker, which will typically make ice cubes or crushed ice. Stand-alone icemaker units that make ice cubes are often called ice machines.

 Ice making machine may refer to either a consumer device for making ice, found inside a home freezer; a stand-alone appliance for making ice, or an industrial machine for making ice on a large scale. The term “ice machine” usually refers to the stand-alone appliance.

The ice generator is the part of the ice machine that actually produces the ice. This would include the evaporator and any associated drives/controls/subframe that are directly involved with making and ejecting the ice into storage. When most people refer to an ice generator, they mean this ice-making subsystem alone, minus refrigeration.

An ice machine, however, particularly if described as ‘packaged’, would typically be a complete machine including refrigeration and controls, requiring only connection to utilities.

1.1 BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY 

Food by its nature begins to spoil the moment it is harvested and for this purpose, in ancient times, in order to survive man had to come up with means of preserving food and for this purpose man had to harness nature in order not to consume the kill or harvest immediately. Freezing was an obvious preservative method to the appropriate climate and geographical areas that have freezing temperatures for even parts of a year made use of the temperature to preserve foods, less than freezing temperatures. Ice was used to prolong storage times, thus ice cellars, caves and cool streams were developed and put to good use, for that purpose wealthy families in Europe, Asia, America had ice cellars or ice houses built to store ice and food on ice, cellars for wine, soon the icehouse became an icebox and because of this the idea of refrigeration came to be. Until the 1800’s when mechanical and thermal refrigeration was introduced ice was mostly used. Therefore ice can be said to be the principal means of refrigeration until the 20th century and it is still in practice in most countries across the globe.

1.2 AIM OF THE PROJECT

The aim of this paper is to get a best performance by an ice block/cube making machine of refrigeration with suitable time. 

The main aim of this project is to construct and fabricate an ice block making machine, a consumer device for making ice.

1.3 OBJECTIVE OF THE PROJECT

The objective of this project work is as follows;

1. To design and fabricate an ice block making machine

2. To increase productivity as well as to reduce the cost of production

3. To create awareness about the benefits of preserving food with ice.

4. To produce ice block within 8 hours and 3 batches of production a day.

1.4 APPLICATIONS OF THE PROJECT

Ice Block Making Machine is fabricated with the latest technology machine specialized in the ice demand of Africa Countries. Ice Block Making Machine is especially designed for tropical conditions and coastal climate. It can be used in the following places:

Ice Factories, Supermarkets, Hotels, Aquatic Production Processing, Fisheries, Poultry Processing, Vegetable / Fruits Processing and Preservation, Meat Processing and Cooling.

Ice making machine can be used in the cooling process, such as temperature controlling, fish fresh freezing, and beverage bottle freezing. 

1.5 BENEFIT OF THE PROJECT

The ambient temperature of tropical countries like Nigeria is as high as 40 o C during the dry season. This ultimately gives rise to increase in demand for ice which is used to reduce the temperature of water, soft-drinks as well as other uses. This increase in demand for ice block makes the design and construction of a machine which can be used for the production of ice within a short period of time in order to save energy and time imperative and a worthwhile venture. 

1.6 SIGNIFICANCE OF THE PROJECT

• One of the most advantages of ice block making machine is convenience. People prefer to use ice block making machine because it is faster and more efficient at cooling stuff. Compared to cooling your drinks in a fridge (too slow) or stuffing them in a freezer (limited by size), ice block making machine can provide more flexible cooling in any location.

• The design and fabrication of ice block making machine would lead to a decrease in the harvest time of ice blocks, it will lead to a significant increase in the volume of ice blocks produced per day, and it will create awareness to the public about the benefits of using a secondary refrigerant in ice making.

• Ice block making machine made a rising trend of outdoor events like weddings, religious gatherings, clubs, relaxation spots and other social gatherings.

• Ice makers are extremely easy to operate, and they are child and user friendly. Making ice is

1.7 SCOPE OF THE PROJECT

Ice making machine consists of four key components; the evaporator, the condenser, the compressor and the throttle valve. The compressor is to compress low pressure refrigerant vapor into high pressure vapor and deliver it to the condenser. The high pressure vapor is condensed into high pressure liquid and drained out through the throttle valve to become low pressure liquid. At this instant the liquid is conducted to the evaporator where heat exchanging occurs and ice is created. This is one complete refrigeration cycle. Ice making machine works on an ideal vapor compression cycle.

A field study of an ice cube making machines in restaurants confirmed that the ice production (i.e. compressor operation) was always coincident with utility peak periods. The measured duty cycles, combined with the actual electric load profiles, demonstrated the potential for off-peak operation in addition to energy saving by using more efficient machines.

1.8 LIMITATION OF THE PROJECT

The only thing that can limit the fabrication of this of this work is that, a fabricated ice making machine is bulky and consumes higher electrical energy.

1.9 STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM

Ice is now produced mechanically on an industrial scale for uses including food storage, chemical manufacturing, concrete mixing, medical usage, curing (first aid), drug storage, etc. Most commercial ice producers or icemakers produces ice in different fragmentary ice which includes; flake ice, tubular, cubes, crushed, using a variety of techniques. This is as a result of ice having a variety of application and high rate of demand. Large ice plants can produce up to 65 tons of ice per day. Small scale ice produces cannot match this since they mostly make use of home refrigerators and due to financial constraints, shortage of power supply.

  This project work however does not solve the problem posed or associated with power shortage or financial constraints being faced by small scale icemakers. This project work is intended to increase the volume of production per day by reducing the harvest time for production of ice, instead of a whole day (24hrs), this work is intended to produce ice within 8 hours and 3 batches of production a day.

1.10 PROJECT WORK ORGANISATION

The various stages involved in the development of this project have been properly put into five chapters to enhance comprehensive and concise reading. In this project thesis, the project is organized sequentially as follows:

Chapter one of this work is on the introduction to this study. In this chapter, the background, significance, scope, application, objective, the need (benefit),  limitation and problem, advantages of this work was discussed.

Chapter two is on literature review of the study. In this chapter, all the literature pertaining to this work was reviewed.

Chapter three is on design methodology. In this chapter all the method involved during the design and construction were discussed.

Chapter four is on testing analysis. All testing that result accurate functionality was analyzed.

Chapter five is on conclusion, recommendation and references.