OIL BEARING MATERIAL CRUSHING PROCESS

An oil bearing vegetable material crushing process including pre-heating and pre-drying the material to generate warm, partially dried oil bearing vegetable material. The partially dried material may then be surface heated rapidly, to generate warm and dried material having a weakened and non-adhering hull. The hull may then be mechanically cracked and removed to yield dehulled oil bearing vegetable material and hull. The dehulled material may be flaked to produce flakes. The flakes may be solvent extracted to generate solvent laden oil and solvent laden meal. The solvent laden meal produced may be desolventized to generate hot, wet meal. The wet meal produced may be dried to generate a hot vapour stream. The hot vapour stream generated by drying the meal is condensed in a condenser. The warm liquid medium produced in the condenser may be used to pre-heat and/or pre-dry the oil bearing vegetable material.