INTRO

HEY!!!!11!!!!1!!! Firstly, let us introduce ourselves; we are THE AWESOME J TEAM

- CONSISTING OF NAEEM, XING HUI, HONG WEI AND J FROM DCHE 2B/05 (we r very fun and cool peeeople to be with k)!!!

Our group will be using this blog to keep updates on our Green Engineering YES Assignment. For our YES assignment, we decided on using rambutan seeds, cause seeing how we're living in the Southeast Asia, a common fruit in this region would be unique and also easy to get. We will be converting rambutan seeds into oil first through soxhlet extraction, then we will convert into our final product, biodiesel through transesterification.

(mmm, just looking at that makes you want to savour them) 
Rambutan is also favourable in making oils, as it has 39% oil percentage in its seeds, higher than its 'rivals', other native to southeast asia fruits like lychee and longan. 
Rambutan is always coined with the term 'exotic superfruit', it has a lot of benefits when eaten (strong antioxidant, increase immunity, cure common illnesses, boosts energy, lower sugar levels etc etc etc)

Even if it is not consumed, it still brings a lot of benefits to the table! (bark can get rid of thrush, roots as repellent to remove internal worms in fruits, leaves to cure headache, fruit skin layer made into decoction can remedy dysentry)

Our plan is firstly to use soxhlet extraction to extract oil from the rambutan seeds.

We chose soxhlet extraction because it is a more efficient method as compared to the use of mechanical press.

As soxhlet extraction uses the theory of washing the sample over and over again with the use of the solvent, it has the ability to obtain more bio-oil. Furthermore, soxhlet is able to isolate desired oil, which has limited solubility in the solvent and the impurity is insoluble in a solvent. Thus making the bio-oil have higher purity.

In order for efficient soxhlet extraction, the seeds are to be grinded into small pieces and also dried to remove moisture content.

After extracting oil, we would proceed with transesterification to produce our desired biodiesel, in which glycerin will also be produced. 

We'll see you later for more updates and we'll explain further!