Chicken plucker - video

[Jon]

Chicken plucker. By Make Stuff with Little Devil. 14:11 video:

Previously:

Wheelbarrow chicken tractor - video
Chicken peck protector - GIF
Chicken catcher GIF

[ibdennyak]

@uite the machine. I always wondered how they did that, and peeled potatoes on a commercial basis.

[Fluffle-Valve]

Can I hear other chickens commenting in the background?

[jatt]

Built something similar years ago with a washing machine as the tub and a centre drum that rotated.

Father worked at a rubber plant, so obtaining "fingers" was easy.

Water birds (ducks and geese) were somewhat more of a challenge.

[clavius]

@uite the machine. I always wondered how they did that, and peeled potatoes on a commercial basis.

There are a few types of potato peeling machines that I have seen from working for a short while at a restaurant equipment dealer years back.

Smaller volume ones look similar to this machine, with a vertical barrel that has a disk at the bottom that has a wavy top surface. the inside of the barrel and the disk at the bottom has what looks like very coarse sandpaper on it. It's a batch processor. You put a bunch of potatoes in the top and and the disk at the bottom spins, rolling them around and up and down the sides, scraping the skin off the potatoes. There is a water feed into the top that washes the skin cuttings away and out the bottom to a sink with a disposal in it.

There are also continuous processors that have two long cylinders, again coated with a rough sandpaper like stuff. They lie parallel to each other and are at a slight angle. They rotate in opposite directions, turning in towards one another. You dump the taters in the high end and the rotation of the cylinders rolls them around and sands the skin off. Again water spray washes the cuttings away. The tilt of the rollers moves them through towards the low end and out into a hopper. Sort of like a trommel screener for dirt.

The ones I saw had cylinders that were maybe 6" in diameter and 5 or 6 feet long. I don't know the numbers but those machines could peel an unbelievable amount of spuds in a day.

[jdurand]

When we worked for a food bank, we'd see strangely "plucked" turkeys and chicks come through. They would be covered with stubs of the feathers as if you removed the feathers with a sheep shearer. Us workers would get leftovers that couldn't be handed out (normally past the sell by date or torn package). After a couple of these sheared birds, we got a lot more picky about what we'd take. It took a lot of work to pull out all the stubs.

Any idea why these were like that?

[NortonDommi]

I used to trap and shoot Possums when I was younger, sleeve skin them and drop smoked skins at a railhead for pickup. It was really good money and helping the environment then the bottom dropped out of the market when the Greenie Eco-terrorists and 'animal rights' activists started bleating. None of those idiots ever saw the devastation wrecked in the bush and on the native fauna by the pests.
These days the money is in the fur, about NZ$90 a kg which is about 15 - 18 Possums, raw skins are $8 - $20 for an A-grade black which is way down on the 1970's prices.

Not chickens but interesting as the technology developed out of chicken pluckers.

[Floradawg]

I'm going out on a limb and guessing this guy is an electrician in a chicken processing plant. The rubber "fingers" he is using are the same as the ones they use. Their machine looks different but basically it works in a similar fashion in that it beats the feathers off after the birds have been scalded in a tank. His electrical skills look pretty good and he used his Channellocks backwards. I worked with an electrician who had that habit, but, a fine electrician he was.