Design and Development of a Hand-Operated Cacao Pod Splitting Device

This research study seeks to design, develop, and fabricate a hand-operated cacao-pod splitting device specifically for the opening process to evaluate the machine's performance in terms of machine capacity, efficiency, quality, and financial performance.Three different sizes with three replications each were evaluated.In calculating the machine performance capacity, the average time of each sample and the pod size was recorded, and the capacity was identified.Findings show that the average output capacity and efficiency of the hand-operated cacao-pod opener is about 761.09 fruit/hour and 93.33%, respectively.The machine was financially feasible, having an NPV of Php 113,844.48,an IRR of 132.702%BCR of about 2.09, and a PBP of less than a year of operation.