The simple machine design results in high reliability and minimal amount of maintenance during the season.

All machines meet OHSA and UL508 requirements. Machines bearing the CE mark (not shown) are also available (with customer supplied guards).

Machine Applications
The Atlas Pacific Apricot pitter is designed to orient, slice and remove the pits from oval shaped apricots. The machine is adjustable to accommodate a wide range of fruit size (1 1/4" (32mm) to 2 1/4" (57mm) diameter). The floating knife feature allows for some variation within the size range while producing high quality halves.

Machine Operation
The apricots are fed from the customer's feed conveyor into the Atlas feed system. The feed system consists of 3 components: the shaker which feeds the fruit into the feed worms in single file; the feed worms which space the fruit and feed it into the pick up pockets of the feed wheels; and the feed wheels which place the fruit on the V-trough orienting belts.

Once on the orienting belts the travelling orienting fingers, located above the belt, rotate the fruit so that the major diameter is vertical and aligned along its suture.

After orientation, the V-belts move the fruit to the cutting area. The cutting area consists of a floating knife system centered over the orienting belt. The serrated knife moves up and down freely and can be adjusted to accommodate variations in fruit size. Each knife includes a shroud to assure that the apricot remains aligned during the cutting process.

Typically the pits fall free after cutting, However, on the occasion of a "stuck pit" the pit kicker blade, located at the rear of each blade assembly, will displace the pit should it still be lodged in the fruit after cutting. The pit kicker oscillates at approximately 1,000 cycles per minutes thus contacting each stuck pit 3 to 4 times as the fruit passes.