Black walnut cracking?

[SamsFarm]

Anyone here do anything with black walnuts?

Now I am not talking about cracking them with a hammer or such, but interested in a home sized industrial cracking machine!

Did you adapt something to do the cracking that works fast and efficient for cheap?

I have heard that a corn sheller will dehusk them, but I have not tried that yet!

A friend has some black walnut trees, but they just clean them outa their yard and throw them in the woods behind thier house!

[Eugene]

Small black walnut cracking machines are available. They are not economical for homeowners. And/but there are small business black walnut processers out there.

Search this site and the internet for black walnuts, black walnut processing. Processing from picking up, hulling, cleaning, curing, cracking, picking meats, is time consuming and labor intensive.

I own some where between 300 and 400 black walnut trees, from very mature to seedlings. Black walnuts only produce a significant amount of nuts every 2nd or 3rd year. I have not had enough nuts to bother picking up for two years. When I do get nuts, I only process enough for meats for family and gifts to friends.

My suggestion. Before you spend any large amount of money for equipment, this fall pickup the nuts from the neighbor's property. Go thru the processing steps. Crack the nuts with a heavy duty hand operated cracker.

[SamsFarm]

Search this site and the internet for black walnuts, black walnut processing. Processing from picking up, hulling, cleaning, curing, cracking, picking meats, is time consuming and labor intensive.

Buyers are in Ohio, but the closest one is not worth the drive to sell them.
Hand processing is too time consuming!

I own some where between 300 and 400 black walnut trees, from very mature to seedlings.

If I had that many black walnut trees, I'd be buying a band mill!

My suggestion. Before you spend any large amount of money for equipment, this fall pickup the nuts from the neighbor's property. Go thru the processing steps. Crack the nuts with a heavy duty hand operated cracker.

I wont! I am too cheap! I want a 4 bushel a hour cracking for under $100 investment!

I have a bushel or so in the garage waiting.

[Eugene]

Buyers are in Ohio, but the closest one is not worth the drive to sell them.

Last fall black walnuts brought $15.00 hulled at the hulling station, located 1/2 mile from the in town house. Pickup load, $60 to $80- US. Figuring in you time picking up walnuts, driving to the hulling station, waiting in line, shoveling the nuts into the huller, waiting for the huller to weigh you pickup load, waiting to get paid, - - - - not worth your time.

I own some where between 300 and 400 black walnut trees.

If I had that many black walnut trees, I'd be buying a band mill!

Not yet. Have several trees that will be very nice verneer logs. Couple of adjacent neighbors had loggers come in and take all of their black walnut. My guess is that the loggers paid enough to purchase another 10 or 20 acres of farm land in this area.

I own some where between 300 and 400 black walnut trees.

I have spent many hours researching black walnut processing equipment. With the cyclical nature of the trees, absolutely no way to turn a profit or pay for the machinery in 10 years.

[Eugene]

I want a 4 bushel a hour cracking for under $100 investment!(

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ltGs2GJN9-E

Above link. I think I will give this a try this winter, after the black walnuts are cured.

[SamsFarm]

I think I will give this a try this winter, after the black walnuts are cured.

Interesting!

Did you see this guy?

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=8XMi4-ZqdEc

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=YlhCausGqho

That got me thinking of how it would work to use a seed cleaner with proper screens to help sort with!

[Eugene]

Have seen a number of home made nut crackers. The vacuum cleaner appears to be the simplest and least expensive.

The suction hull remover appears interesting, simple to make. Thinking that the location where the meats/hulls are input could be up several inches on the side. That would be much easier to input the meats/hulls and the meats would still fall to the bottom.