Automatic purple sweet potato Powder Production Line

Completely different from the “no standard, need pioneering” production lines such as baobab powder and EPDM rubber powder you inquired about earlier, the automatic purple sweet potato powder production line is a mature category that has been completely conquered by China’s food machinery industry. You don’t need to search blindly like looking for an EPDM rubber powder line, nor do you need to customize from scratch like making baobab powder. However, there is a “route selection” issue that must first be clarified: the characteristics of purple sweet potato with starch and high anthocyanin determine that it has three technical routes, the equipment is completely not universal, and the product form and application scenarios are also very different. Below, based on the complete patent family from 2010 to 2025, the public technical specifications of equipment manufacturers and the put-into-production cases, I will disassemble the real level and selection logic of the three routes for you, with detailed explanations of each point in paragraphs, natural integration of relevant equipment and raw material terms, and simple and easy-to-understand language.

First Determine the Route: The Essential Division of the Three Major Technical Systems (A Must-Make Choice for You)

Purple sweet potato powder is not “one product”, but three completely different industrial intermediates. You must first answer: Who am I going to sell to? What is it used for? Unlike production lines that process raw materials such as Seasam, Peanut, wheat, corn, coffee, rice, bean, mushroom, bone, seeds, meat, tea, flour, spice, tobacco, salt, sugar, metal, chemical, Medicine, etc., or rely on various grinding equipment such as grinding machine, herb grinder, Industrial Weed Grinder, small grinder machine, cryogenic grinding machine, Dry Fruit Powder Grinder Machine, the automatic purple sweet potato powder production line has clear technical routes, and each route has matching special equipment, which is different from the equipment used for processing cassava, dry ginger, licorice, black pepper and other materials, such as cassava grinding machine, dry ginger grinding machine, licorice grinding machine, black pepper grinder.

Route A is cooked whole powder (hot roller drying method), whose product form is flaky → broken into flocculent pieces/coarse powder. Its core feature is ripening (starch gelatinization), and it is close to fresh purple sweet potato puree after rehydration. It is mainly used for baking (bread, pastries), purple sweet potato puree raw materials, and infant supplementary food. Its core competitiveness lies in taste, color and high yield. The core equipment includes steam peeling machine, cooking machine, drum dryer, diaphragm crusher. Its automation level is full-line continuous and PLC controlled (mature in 2013). The investment per ton of powder is 3-8 million yuan (10 tons/day level), with 5-star technical maturity (domestic leading), and the representative information source is the patent of Dongtai Food Machinery Factory.

Route B is raw powder/juice powder (spray drying method), whose product form is fine powder (80-150 mesh). Its core feature is raw powder with good fluidity and easy solubility. It is mainly used for solid beverages, instant soups and food coloring. Its core competitiveness is fineness, solubility and low cost. The core equipment includes beater, homogenizer, centrifugal spray drying tower. Its automation level is single tower full automatic, and manual operation is required at the front end. The investment per ton of powder is 2-6 million yuan (including spray tower), with 4-star technical maturity (universal in the beverage industry), and the representative equipment is Changzhou Nanfang Drying LPG-600.

Route C is freeze-dried powder (vacuum freeze-drying method), whose product form is spongy loose block → easy to crush with light grinding. Its core feature is raw powder with complete structure and extremely fast rehydration. It is mainly used for high-end health products, meal replacement powder and aerospace food. Its core competitiveness is nutrition retention rate (anthocyanin retention rate > 90%). The core equipment includes quick-freezing warehouse, vacuum freeze dryer, cryogenic grinding machine. Its automation level is batch-type full automatic, and feeding and discharging are semi-automatic. The investment per ton of powder is 20-100 million yuan (freeze-drying line), with 4-star technical maturity (mature equipment, high investment), and the representative equipment is Shanghai Tuofen freeze dryer.

The decision-making logic (please find your own position) is as follows: If you make baking raw materials and food industrial raw materials and pursue cost performance and taste, choose Route A: cooked whole powder (the “orthodox” route of purple sweet potato powder and the strongest item of Chinese equipment manufacturers). If you make solid beverages and milk tea raw materials and require instant solubility and bright color, choose Route B: spray-dried powder (mature equipment, but purple sweet potato has high sugar content and is easy to stick to the wall, requiring special anti-sticking design). If you position high-end organic, infant standard and health products without budget limit, choose Route C: freeze-dried powder (the highest nutrition, whose price is 5-10 times that of the first two). When selecting equipment for each route, you can choose appropriate grinders according to needs, such as 500KG Grinder for large-scale production and 200KG grinder for small and medium-sized production, and some export-oriented equipment also has CE Certificate grinder to meet international standards.

Detailed Explanation of Route A: Automatic Production Line of Cooked Whole Powder (China’s Advantageous Technology)

This is the only localized scheme with complete independent intellectual property rights, full-line connection and batch landing in the purple sweet potato powder industry. Dongtai Food Machinery Factory Co., Ltd. realized the continuous operation of this production line in 2013, and it is still the industry benchmark so far. Unlike the production lines that use Air cooled crusher, coarse crusher, Hammer Mill, Ultrafine Grinder, vibrating pulverizer, turbo grinder and other equipment for crushing hard materials, the core of this production line is ripening and drying, and the crushing link only needs simple equipment, such as small grinder machine, which is different from high speed Dry Grinder and cutting type grinder used for processing hard materials.

The complete process includes 16 sections of equipment, from fresh potatoes to finished powder. The first section is cleaning and impurity removal, using a cyclone stone removal cleaning machine to separate sand and gravel by gravity air flow, with PLC joint control and water recycling for energy saving. The second section is deep cleaning, using a cage-type cleaning machine to roll the drum to remove surface soil, with interlocking control and a processing capacity of ≥3 tons per hour. The third section is metering, using a weighing instrument for batch metering as the basis for formulation, with data upload and ±0.5% accuracy.

The fourth section is peeling, using a rotary steam peeling machine, which is core equipment: high-temperature steam is sprayed instantaneously to separate the skin from the flesh, with automatic temperature/pressure control. Compared with alkali peeling, it has no chemical residue and improved yield. Most of these peeling machines are made of stainless steel, which is corrosion-resistant and easy to clean, meeting food hygiene standards. The fifth section is residual skin cleaning, using a brush peeling cleaning machine to remove residual thin skin with soft brushes, with conveyor interlocking to protect the integrity of the flesh. The sixth section is quality inspection, using a quality inspection conveyor for manual sorting (the only manual node so far), with lighting/speed assistance to eliminate diseased and green-headed potatoes.

The seventh section is slicing, using a slicer to cut into uniform slices with a thickness of 3-5mm, with servo thickness adjustment to facilitate uniform cooking in the subsequent process. The eighth section is color protection/blanching, using a blanching machine for hot water or steam treatment to inactivate enzymes and fix colors, with automatic temperature control at 80-95℃, which is the key to anthocyanin stability. The ninth section is cooling, using a cooler for cold air/cold water cooling, with temperature interlocking to terminate the enzymatic hydrolysis reaction.

The tenth section is cooking, using a cooking machine, which is core equipment: atmospheric pressure/pressure cooking for full starch gelatinization, with PLC control of time and temperature, which determines “rehydration” and taste. The eleventh section is puree making, using a puree making machine to beat cooked potato chips into puree without granular feeling, with adjustable speed to prepare materials for drum drying. The twelfth section is drying, using a drum dryer, which is the heart of the whole production line: the puree is coated on the heating drum and instantly forms a film, with automatic control of temperature, speed and film thickness, single drum/double drum, and thermal efficiency far higher than that of the spray tower. Some large-scale production lines also use large drum dryers matched with 500KG Grinder-level power supply to ensure production capacity.

The thirteenth section is crushing, using a diaphragm crusher to crush dry diaphragms into irregular flocculent pieces/particles, with adjustable screen mesh to control the particle size of finished products. This crusher is a type of small grinder machine, which is simple to operate and easy to maintain. The fourteenth section is classification, using a screening machine to produce 40-80 mesh standard powder, with automatic material return and coarse powder returning to crushing. The fifteenth section is packaging, using a packaging machine for automatic metering, nitrogen filling and sealing, full automatic, with light-proof material to prevent anthocyanin oxidation. The sixteenth section is conveying, using conveyors/pumps for material transfer between sections, full-line connected, with patented core: conveyor + pump network. Important equipment such as conveyors and pumps are equipped with stable chargers to ensure continuous and stable operation.

The industrial significance of this production line is as follows: it does not use any chemical synthetic agents (no alkali solution, no sulfite), has a clean label, and meets the standards for export to the European Union; it realizes continuous large-scale production instead of intermittent production, with a single-line daily output of 5-15 tons of cooked whole powder; it has excellent rehydration performance: it becomes fresh purple sweet potato puree after stirring with hot water, and does not fade during baking; it has already achieved the evaluation of “high automation level” in 2013, and there is currently an MES upgraded version. Unlike the production lines that process cannabis, metal and other special materials, this production line is safe and environmentally friendly, and the equipment is easy to maintain.

Information gaps and status updates: It must be explained to you that the above patent documents were all published between 2010 and 2014, which is 11-15 years ago. This means that the technology has long been industrialized, and enterprises such as Dongtai Food Machinery Factory are still producing such production lines; however, there is a lack of the latest case data after 2020 in the public domain (such as specific energy consumption indicators, the latest PLC/DCS architecture); when you inquire about prices, you must require suppliers to provide delivered cases in the past 3 years and technical iteration instructions. In addition, when upgrading the production line, you can also configure Dust Grinder and dust collector grinder to improve the working environment and product quality.

Detailed Explanation of Route B: Spray Drying Method

If you clearly need “instant soluble, no granular feeling” fine powder (such as used in milk tea shops, solid beverages), this route is the only choice. Unlike the production lines that use airflow pulverizer, Vacuum Mill, Ultrafine Grinder and other equipment to process fine powder of hard materials, the spray drying method is more suitable for processing liquid materials into fine powder, which is different from the equipment used for processing dry fruits, such as Dry Fruit Powder Grinder Machine.

Industrial benchmark: Changzhou Nanfang Drying LPG-600 purple sweet potato powder spray tower. The detailed technical specifications released by this equipment manufacturer in 2025 are the most complete and timely spray-dried purple sweet potato powder scheme in the public domain so far. Its processing capacity is 800kg/h of feed, 553kg/h of evaporated water, and 247kg/h of powder production, with a single tower daily capacity of about 6 tons of powder (24h). The inlet air temperature is 200℃. The heat resistance of purple sweet potato anthocyanin is medium, so this temperature requires instantaneous drying to reduce loss. The outlet air temperature is 90℃ to control the residual temperature in the tower and prevent thermal degradation.

The atomizer is a high-speed centrifugal type, 15500r/min, with an atomizing disk of Ø0.2m. The uniformity of atomization determines the particle shape, which is the key to fineness. The tower size is Ø6.8m × H12.5m, requiring a plant net height of ≥14 meters, which is a rigid constraint on civil engineering conditions. The heat source is a direct-fired gas hot air furnace, consuming 90m³/h of gas, and natural gas is preferred, while coal-fired has been eliminated. The material collection method is cyclone separation + bag dust removal, with a yield of ≥98% and up-to-standard tail gas. The material is SUS304 in contact with materials, meeting food hygiene standards. The installed power is 110kW (excluding heat source), and the power consumption is about 0.45kWh/kg of powder. The automation level is touch screen + PLC, with automatic adjustment of inlet and outlet air temperature, requiring manual monitoring of atomizer current and wall sticking.

The “wall sticking” dead end of purple sweet potato spray drying and patent solution: Industry pain point: purple sweet potato has high sugar content (about 5-8% in fresh potatoes), and it is very easy to absorb moisture and stick to the wall during spray drying, which will reduce the yield at least, and block the tower body and cause coking at worst. This is an unavoidable technical difficulty of the spray route. Mature solution (patent technology in 2017): anti-sticking wall scraper mechanism: the scraper is adapted to the shape of the inner wall of the tower, and the drive unit scrapes periodically or continuously to forcibly peel off the adhering powder; air blowing device + filter: the material collector assists fluidization to prevent blockage of the discharge port; precise temperature control: ±1℃ temperature control to avoid local overheating and sugar melting.

Current situation evaluation: The patent’s legal status is “patent right terminated due to failure to pay annual fee” (around 2021), indicating that this technical scheme has entered the public domain and can be adopted by any equipment manufacturer. But does this mean that the wall sticking problem of purple sweet potato spray drying has been completely solved? Not necessarily—it is more mitigation than radical cure. When you inquire about prices, you must ask: What are the specific anti-sticking wall technical measures of your company’s purple sweet potato powder spray tower? Is the scraper standard? What is the guaranteed yield? In addition, when configuring the spray tower, you can also match Electric Grinder and universal grinder for auxiliary processing of raw materials to improve product quality.

The essential differences between the spray drying route and the cooked whole powder route: In terms of ripening, the cooked whole powder (drum) is yes (starch has been gelatinized), while the spray-dried powder is no (raw powder). In terms of rehydrated state, the cooked whole powder is puree-like with fiber feeling, while the spray-dried powder is paste-like without particles. In terms of main cost, the cooked whole powder mainly consumes steam and electricity, while the spray-dried powder mainly consumes natural gas and electricity. In terms of investment threshold, the whole line of cooked whole powder starts from 3 million yuan, while the single tower of spray-dried powder starts from 1.5 million yuan (excluding the front end). In terms of localization degree, the cooked whole powder is extremely high with leading whole line manufacturers, while the spray-dried powder is high but needs customization for purple sweet potato. Decision suggestion: Do not use the spray tower to imitate the taste of cooked whole powder—these two types of products are sold to different customers. In addition, the equipment of both routes can choose stainless steel materials to improve corrosion resistance and service life.

Detailed Explanation of Route C: Vacuum Freeze-Drying Method (High-End Locking)

If you position infant supplementary food, organic certification, health products and military food with sufficient budget, this is the only route that can maximize the retention of anthocyanin (retention rate > 90%) and has excellent rehydration performance. Unlike the production lines that use cryogenic grinding machine, Dry Fruit Powder Grinder Machine and other equipment for processing common powder, the vacuum freeze-drying method has higher requirements on equipment, and the core equipment is vacuum freeze dryer, which is different from Dust Grinder and Air cooled crusher used for common crushing.

Industrial equipment benchmark (Shanghai Tuofen, 2024 parameters): The effective shelf area is 2㎡ (this is laboratory/pilot scale, industrial scale needs 20-100㎡), with a fresh potato processing capacity of about 200-500kg/batch. The shelf temperature is -50℃ ~ +60℃, with sufficient quick-freezing temperature. The condenser temperature is -55℃ ~ -60℃, with a water catching capacity of 25kg. The ultimate vacuum is 10Pa, providing a sublimation drying environment. The total power is 22kW, with extremely high energy consumption. The control level is PLC full automatic, touch screen operation, remote monitoring, and freeze-drying curve storage, with mature automation. The additional functions include CIP online cleaning, SIP online disinfection, and hydraulic capping, which can be upgraded to pharmaceutical grade. The area/height is 15㎡×2.5m, with low requirements on plant height. Most of these equipment are large, made of high-quality stainless steel, and some export-oriented models are equipped with CE Certificate grinder to meet international standards.

The real investment of industrial freeze-drying line: 2㎡ freeze dryer (as above table): about 500,000-800,000 yuan (for experiment/pilot scale); industrial grade (50-100㎡): 20-100 million yuan (referring to Genhe blueberry freeze-dried powder project); the comprehensive cost of purple sweet potato freeze-dried powder: 5-10 times that of hot air dried powder, and the terminal price needs to be > 200 yuan/kg to have profit. When configuring the industrial freeze-drying line, you can choose 500KG Grinder or 200KG grinder according to the production capacity to meet the needs of different scales.

The key process points of freeze-dried purple sweet potato powder: Pretreatment: cleaning, peeling, slicing (sharing equipment with Route A). Quick freezing: below -35℃, so that water forms small ice crystals without damaging the cell structure. Sublimation drying: vacuum degree < 100Pa, temperature slowly rises to 50-60℃, and ice crystals directly sublimate into water vapor. Crushing: freeze-dried slices are extremely brittle and easy to crush with light grinding, without strong crushing (less heat generation, no damage to nutrition). For crushing, small grinder machine or Electric Grinder can be used, which is simple to operate and does not damage nutrients. Packaging: nitrogen filling + light protection is a must. Freeze-dried powder has a large specific surface area and is very easy to absorb moisture and oxidize.

Automation level: The freeze-drying process can be fully automatically controlled by program, but the current feeding and discharging are mostly manual or semi-automatic (pallet loading and unloading). Continuous vacuum freeze-drying lines are only owned by a few global giants (such as GEA, Alfa Laval), and domestic equipment is mainly batch-type automatic feeding and discharging. In addition, when processing freeze-dried purple sweet potato powder, auxiliary equipment such as airflow pulverizer and Ultrafine Grinder can also be configured to improve the fineness of the product, which is suitable for high-end health products and infant supplementary food. The equipment is equipped with stable chargers to ensure continuous operation.

Clear Elimination of Four “Interfering Information” (You Don’t Need to Waste Time)

The search results contain a lot of irrelevant or misleading content related to the “automatic purple sweet potato powder production line”, which are eliminated one by one for you. The first type of information is “10,000 jin automatic sweet potato vermicelli machine per day” from Goodway. It is excluded because sweet potato vermicelli ≠ purple sweet potato powder, vermicelli is starch processing, and powder is whole powder processing, with 0 value and completely irrelevant. Unlike the production lines that process vermicelli, the purple sweet potato powder production line does not need equipment for starch extraction, but focuses on drying and crushing, using equipment such as Dry Grinder and small grinder machine.

The second type is the overview page of “purple sweet potato powder processing equipment” from Kunshan Xiang’ou. It is excluded because it only has a qualitative description of “high automation level”, no equipment list, no parameters and no cases, with extremely low reference value, only as a clue. The third type is “purple sweet potato belt dryer” from China Powder Network. It is excluded because it is a single machine equipment, not a whole line; it is suitable for the dehydrated vegetable section, not a special whole line scheme for purple sweet potato powder. It can be used as an alternative for the drying link in Route A, but it is not the mainstream. This belt dryer is different from the drum dryer used in Route A, and its drying efficiency is lower than that of the drum dryer. It can be matched with Air cooled crusher for auxiliary processing.

The fourth type is “10,000-50,000 yuan” purple sweet potato powder production line from Jiangsu Yutong. It is excluded because this is the reference price of a single belt dryer, not the whole production line. Do not be misled. The investment of the industrial whole line is more than 100 times this price. Core warning: For the purple sweet potato powder production line, a single dryer ≠ the whole production line. Any “purple sweet potato powder production line” with a quotation lower than 500,000 yuan is either laboratory equipment or a single machine pretending to be a whole line. In addition, when purchasing equipment, it is necessary to distinguish between equipment for processing food and non-food materials, such as Industrial Weed Grinder and cannabis processing equipment, which are not applicable to purple sweet potato powder production.

Ultimate Decision-Making Framework: Who Should You Find After All?

Step 1: Please find your own position. If your target product and market are baking raw materials, food ingredients and export-grade purple sweet potato whole powder, the recommended route is Route A: cooked whole powder. The core equipment combination is steam peeling + cooking + drum drying + crushing and screening. The real automation level is full-line continuous, PLC centralized control, 1-2 people per shift. The investment reference (whole line) is 3-8 million yuan (5-15 tons/day). The preferred supplier type is Dongtai Food Machinery Factory (patent holder) and its technology-derived enterprises. The equipment of this route can choose stainless steel materials, and configure 200KG grinder or 500KG Grinder according to the production capacity.

If your target product and market are solid beverages, milk tea raw materials and instant fruit and vegetable powder, the recommended route is Route B: spray drying. The core equipment combination is beating and homogenizing + spray drying + anti-sticking wall device. The real automation level is spray tower automatic, and manual feeding is required at the front end. The investment reference (whole line) is 2-6 million yuan (including spray tower and pretreatment). The preferred supplier types are Changzhou Nanfang Drying, Changzhou Yutong and Xishan Xuelang. When configuring the equipment, you can match universal grinder and airflow pulverizer to improve product quality.

If your target product and market are infant standard food, health products and organic freeze-dried powder, the recommended route is Route C: freeze-drying. The core equipment combination is cleaning and slicing + quick-freezing warehouse + freeze dryer + nitrogen-filled packaging. The real automation level is batch full automatic, and feeding and discharging are semi-automatic. The investment reference (whole line) is 20-100 million yuan (industrial grade). The preferred supplier types are Shanghai Tuofen, Beijing Songyuan and Yantai Binglun. The equipment of this route can be equipped with cryogenic grinding machine and Vacuum Mill to ensure product quality.

Step 2: Precise inquiry script template. If you take Route A (cooked whole powder, recommended), you can say: “Our company plans to build a fully automatic production line for purple sweet potato cooked whole powder, referring to your company’s (or Dongtai Food Machinery Factory’s) patent technology route in 2013, requiring full-section continuous operation including cyclone stone removal, cage-type cleaning, rotary steam peeling, cooking, drum drying, diaphragm crushing, screening and packaging, with PLC centralized control. The target production capacity is daily processing of [X] tons of fresh potatoes (or daily output of [X] tons of dry powder). Please provide: 1. The put-into-production cases of purple sweet potato/sweet potato cooked whole powder lines in the past 3 years and the on-site inspection address; 2. The whole line equipment list, 3D layout drawing, total installed power and steam consumption; 3. The estimated comprehensive cost per ton of powder (excluding raw materials).” When inquiring, you can also ask about the configuration of auxiliary equipment such as Dust Grinder and dust collector grinder.

If you take Route B (spray drying), you can say: “Our company needs a special centrifugal spray drying system for purple sweet potato powder. The material is purple sweet potato beating slurry (high sugar content), which requires the configuration of anti-sticking wall scraper mechanism or equivalent anti-sticking technology. Processing capacity: feed rate [X] kg/h, inlet air temperature 200℃, outlet air temperature 90℃. Please provide: 1. Your company’s successful cases in spray drying of high-sugar fruit and vegetable powder; 2. The measured yield, fineness and color retention data of purple sweet potato powder; 3. Tower material, atomizer brand and control system details.” You can also ask about the matching of Electric Grinder and small grinder machine.

If you take Route C (freeze-drying), you can say: “Our company needs an industrial-grade purple sweet potato freeze-drying production line, requiring batch full automatic control and reserved CIP/SIP interface. The processing capacity of fresh potatoes per batch is ≥ [X] tons, including the whole process of pretreatment cleaning and slicing, quick freezing, freeze drying, low-temperature crushing and nitrogen-filled packaging. Please provide the list of accepted fruit and vegetable freeze-drying whole line customers.” When inquiring, you can ask about the configuration of cryogenic grinding machine and Ultrafine Grinder.

Final Summary: You Are in a Track with “Standard Answers”

Completely different from the baobab powder (no global standard) and EPDM rubber powder (needing cross-industry transplantation) you inquired about earlier, the automatic purple sweet potato powder production line is a mature position conquered by China’s food machinery industry. You don’t need to be a pioneer. What you need to do is just: 1. Choose one from the three route maps (99% of investors choose Route A); 2. Find the leading equipment manufacturers corresponding to this route (the first choice for Route A is the patent holder); 3. Inquiry with clear production capacity goals. When selecting equipment, you can choose appropriate grinders according to the production scale, such as 500KG Grinder for large-scale production and 200KG grinder for small and medium-sized production, and most equipment can choose stainless steel materials to improve service life.

The equipment used in the purple sweet potato powder production line involves a variety of grinders and crushers, such as grinding machine, herb grinder, small grinder machine, cryogenic grinding machine, Dry Fruit Powder Grinder Machine, Air cooled crusher, cassava grinding machine, 500KG Grinder, 200KG grinder, CE Certificate grinder, universal grinder, airflow pulverizer, Dust Grinder, Hammer Mill, Ultrafine Grinder, vibrating pulverizer, turbo grinder, dust collector grinder, Vacuum Mill, high speed Dry Grinder, cutting type grinder, Electric Grinder, etc., which can be selected according to different technical routes and production needs. At the same time, the production line involves processing food raw materials, so it is necessary to ensure that the equipment meets food hygiene standards, and the materials in contact with food are preferably stainless steel.

If you can tell me your target production capacity (daily processing capacity of fresh potatoes in tons) and main target market (baking/beverage/export/infant standard), I can reversely deduce the accurate equipment configuration list and investment threshold for you based on the historical engineering benchmark of Dongtai Food Machinery Factory and the latest quotation system of Changzhou Nanfang Drying. In addition, I can also help you select appropriate auxiliary equipment, such as matching Dust Grinder and dust collector grinder to improve the working environment, and configuring Electric Grinder and universal grinder to improve product quality, ensuring that the production line is efficient, stable and meets market demand.