Abstract: Method and apparatus for continuous production of tortilla chips, including mixing tortilla flour and water to form a dough, rolling the dough into a coninuous sheet, cutting tortilla shapes from the sheet, moving the tortilla shapes continuously through a baking oven to produce baked products, moving the baked products continuously along an equilibration conveyor to substantially equalize the moisture content of each baked product throughout the product to form an equilibrated product, moving the equilibrated product continuously through a refrigeration unit to cool the product to form a cooled product, cutting the cooled products into chip shapes, and moving the chip shapes to a fryer to produce the tortilla chips. The frying step may be continuous or batch as desired.

Abstract: A filter press tray separating device has a latch and a pawl for engaging neighboring plates to be separated from the end of a pack of plates and means for separating the pawl from the latch while they engage respectively the end and next-to-end plates of the pack so that the separating force exerted by the pawl on the end plate is matched by an opposite reactive force exerted by the latch on the next-to-end plate, the device including means for disengaging the latch and pawl when a plate has been separated and for repositioning it at the next pair of plates to be separated. The latch and the pawl are both carried by a movable carriage means that moves along a stationary frame that extends along the longitudinal axis of the pack of plates.