In this section:
Grading
Grading involves the removal of fruit that is uneconomical to dry. Some of this fruit can be diverted to other outlets. Small fruit can be sold for juicing and sloppy ripe fruit can be made into kamaradin. Discard any fruit showing fungal rots or decay as it will dry black.
Fruit for drying is ripe and prone to physical damage, so minimise handling. Combine any form of grading with the cutting operation. Actual methods of achieving this depend on whether hand or machine cutting is used.
If all cutting is done by hand, instruct the cutters to discard any fruit with a rotten or yeasty appearance. Fruit must be very overripe before it needs to be diverted from drying, as soft fruit that is carefully hand cut will make a high quality product.
When machine cutting manual grading out can be done on the feed hopper or along the infeed belt to the fruit aligner. Pick out and hand cut any fruit too ripe to be satisfactorily cut by the machine and discard any rotten fruit.
Grade out small fruit as it is more profitable to sell this fruit for juice than it is to dry it. Most new cutting machines can mechanically grade out small fruit, either with a specialised section or in the aligner. Refer to the section on cutting machines.
