Industrial sourcing · China to Europe

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Buyer guide · Agriculture & feed

Fish feed extruder from China

Whether a pellet floats or sinks is set by the process, dry or wet, single or twin screw, and most listings do not tell you which one you are buying.

Ask about this machine ↗Where the numbers come from

Written and listings checked 30 September 2026. Every figure on this page names its source.

What you are actually comparing.

Two quotes, one machine name

What hides inside the price

Dry or wet extrusion

A dry extruder cooks the mash by friction alone and suits a simple floating feed. A wet extruder adds steam and water in a preconditioner, giving steadier expansion and better control of sinking feed. It also needs a boiler.

Single or twin screw

Twin screw machines handle high-fat recipes, small shrimp and fry pellets, and changeovers with less waste. Single screw is enough for one or two standard floating recipes.

Screw, barrel and die wear parts

Fish meal and minerals are abrasive. Ask for screw segment and barrel liner material, their hardening, and how many hours the seller expects between replacements.

Cutter and die plate range

Pellet size is set by die holes and cutter speed. Count the die plates included against every size you sell, from starter crumble to grow-out.

Dryer, coater and cooler

Pellets leave the extruder wet. The dryer decides final moisture and shelf life, and a vacuum or drum coater adds oil after drying. These often sit in a separate quote.

Before you ask for a price.

Send these with the enquiry. Without them, any number a factory gives you is a guess dressed as a quotation.

The species and life stages you feed, and whether each feed must float, sink slowly or sink fast.
Your recipe, with fish meal, plant protein, starch and oil levels.
Every pellet diameter you need, from the smallest to the largest.
Output per hour of dried feed, not wet extrudate.
Whether steam is on site, and whether the dryer, oil coater and cooler are in scope.

Turn the claim into a demonstration.

Require this	A pass looks like
Run your recipe to steady state and weigh dried output per hour at your main pellet size.	Dried output per hour recorded against the offer, with the moisture of the dried pellet measured.
Drop a counted sample of pellets into water and time how they behave.	The share floating or sinking after the agreed time meets the figure written into the contract.
Change to your smallest pellet size and time the changeover.	Changeover time and the kilograms of off-spec feed produced are recorded and inside the agreed limit.

The documents that must arrive with it.

EU Declaration of Conformity with model and serial number, under 2006/42/EC until 19 January 2027 and Regulation (EU) 2023/1230 after.
Low voltage 2014/35/EU and EMC 2014/30/EU references for the drives and control cabinet.
Material and hardness data for screw segments, barrel liners and die plates, with a wear-part price list.

The one people forget. The screw configuration drawing, showing each segment and its position. Without it, a worn screw cannot be rebuilt the same way and the pellet changes.

When this is the wrong machine.

Buy something else if

Named, not hedged

Your fish take a sinking pellet and you never need floating feed.

An animal feed pellet machine with a fine die can be enough and costs less to run.

You buy feed in small amounts for one pond.

Commercial feed. An extruder only pays when its hours are filled with your own recipes.

Where the numbers come from.

We name the kind of source, how many and when, and never the factory. Listed prices are asking prices, not landed cost. Where we do not hold a fact we say so: that is a GAP, not an estimate.

Listings · 14Fourteen floating fish feed extruder listings on one marketplace, checked September 2026, asked from US$500 to over US$1.1 million. One stated wet type and four stated twin screw; the rest named neither. Listed prices are asking prices, not landed cost.
Listings · 1One twin screw listing, checked September 2026, stated 100 to 3,000 kg per hour across its range, a thirtyfold spread under one listing.
Arithmetic3,000 divided by 100 is 30, so a capacity range that wide says little until your recipe and pellet size are fixed.
GAPGAP - no supplier quotations logged for this machine yet. Three to five quotations for one configuration would give a real price spread.

Related machines.

Animal feed pellet machine. Read it if your animals eat a pressed pellet and nothing needs to float.
Grain dryer. Read it if drying your own grain ahead of feed making is the bigger bottleneck.

Every machine we source in this area is on the Agriculture & feed page. How a project runs, stage by stage, is on how it works, and what it costs is on pricing.

Straight answers

Questions buyers ask about this machine.

Which fish feed extruder from China suits a new farm?+

The one whose process matches your feed. For floating grow-out feed on one recipe, a dry single screw may do. For shrimp, fry or sinking feed, a wet twin screw line with a preconditioner is the usual choice.

Chinese vs European fish feed extruder: where is the gap?+

In screw metallurgy, process control and recipe support. Ask any supplier, European or Chinese, to run your recipe and put the measured result in the contract.

What CE documentation does a fish feed extruder need?+

A Declaration of Conformity for the extruder and each separate machine in the line, the manual, and the risk assessment behind them. A boiler and steam piping need their own papers and local permits.

Does feed law apply to the extruder?+

Regulation (EC) 183/2005 on feed hygiene binds the business making the feed. The machine question is cleanability and how residues are removed between recipes.

Contact

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