The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
May. 11, 2004
Filed:
Jan. 31, 2002
Manuel J. Rubio, Miami Beach, FL (US);
Roberto Contreras, Guadalupe, MX;
Francisco Sosa, Guadalupe, MX;
Other;
Abstract
A process and apparatus improvement for energy and particulate recovery during the production of nixtamalized corn flour, by precooking with a lime solution to effect partial cooking, reduced energy use for pre-cooking and washing by recycling hot water. Next, moisture content is stabilized, and the corn is milled and dried in a super-heated stream of air with reduced energy consumption by recycling waste hot air. Dust trapping is performed on a portion of waste hot air which is reused for preheating combustion air. Wet scrubbing of the remaining waste hot air is performed where heated water is reused and exhaust air vented. Cooling and further drying of the dried-milled particles follows. A fine grind or flour is separated and recovered from the coarse grind which is also aspirated to isolate a hull fraction as corn waste along with particulate collected after entrapping and scrubbing waste hot air. Re-milling and sieving the coarse grind produces a corn flour for tortilla and the like.