Application Notes & Case Studies

Ice Cream Ingredient Feeding

Application Notes & Case Studies /

In this case a customer was looking to replace existing fruit feeder technology in order to achieve a higher degree of accuracy in the feeding of high quality, costly ice cream ingredients without damage to the individual ingredients. In addition, the design must meet the strictest cleanliness standards of the dairy industry, with minimal downtime for disassembly and cleaning operations. Operation is continuous duty, up to 24 hours per day.
Inclusions are manually dumped into a large hopper from boxes, bags or small drums. The feeder discharges the inclusions directly into an ice cream mix pump line. As materials are discharged gravimetrically from the feeder, they are distributed into the ice cream mix flow and pumped continuously downstream to the packaging line.

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Feeding and Conveying in Tortilla Production

Application Notes & Case Studies /

In both types of tortilla production, pneumatic transfer via both pressure and vacuum is used as a method of delivery of the raw ingredients to the cookers and mixers. Volumetric screw feeders are used to accurately dose the lime to the nixtamalization process. Since tortillas are rapidly becoming a mainstream staple they are often fortified. In this case screw feeders are used for the dosing of vitamins (iron, zinc, thiamin, riboflavin, niacin and folic acid) to the corn and wheat flour tortilla premixes. In this application example we will examine the details of the corn tortilla process. However, it should be noted that the same principles of conveying and feeding are applied in the wheat flour tortilla process.

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Metering Ingredients for Snack Mixes

Application Notes & Case Studies /

Multi component snack mixes are becoming popular quick snack options. Coperion K-Tron has supplied a variety of weigh belt feeder/system combinations for the metering of these components into the mix and prior to the packaging line. By utilizing a high accuracy feed mechanism, such as the Coperion K-Tron Smart Weigh Belt (SWB), the end user can be assured of ingredient cost control and high product quality.

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Inclined Screw Feeder for Metering Sprouted Grain at Bakery

Application Notes & Case Studies /

A bakery received sprouted wheat grain in bulk bags and needed to precisely meter it to a hopper to begin the bread making process. KWS provided a unique, food grade solution for the application. KWS provided a special inlet to match the incline of the screw feeder and the discharge of the bulk bag unloader. The inlet was round and tapered down to match the tubular housing for the screw feeder. KWS added a sock bead on the inlet to attach a flexible connection to the bulk bag unloader. The discharge of the inclined screw feeder also had a sock bead for attachment of a flexible connection to downstream equipment. To provide accurate metering, the screw conveyor had variable pitch flighting under the inlet area to accurately meter the sprouted wheat grain up the incline.

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Major Canadian Bakery Standardizes on Centrifugal Sifter for Large-Scale Screening of Flour

Application Notes & Case Studies /

Flour is stored in two 70,000 lb (31,752 kg) silos equipped with rotary airlocks feeding a pneumatic conveying system that delivers material to the sifter. The flour enters a vertical inlet at the feed end of the centrifugal sifter, a horizontal, cylindrical machine that houses a 30 mesh (516 micron) stainless steel cylindrical screen mounted on a central shaft that is fitted with helical paddles. A 3 hp (2.2 kw) motor rotates the paddles, which accelerate the speed at which on-size flour passes through apertures in the screen and drops into the pneumatic line below. Oversize debris is ejected through the back end of the cylinder into a sealed quick-release receptacle. Each sifter processes about 34 kg/min (75 lb/min) of flour.

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Munson Machinery Batch Rotary Mixer – Case History – New England Coffee

Application Notes & Case Studies /

After the successful tests, New England Coffee installed a model 700-TH-25-SS rotary batch blender. The stainless steel blender’s drum has a 25-cubic-foot batch volume and a 500-pound capacity. The unit has an internal sprayline to apply liquid flavoring to the coffee beans. The sprayline and nozzles are mounted off-center in the drum. The mixing action continuously replaces the coffee beans in the spray zone so that a thorough coating occurs with no overspraying. The rotary batch blender’s internal lifters and baffles, which provide the blending action, are bolted to brackets that are welded to the drum wall. For more stringent sanitary applications (such as food and pharmaceutical production), the lifters and baffles can be continuously welded to the drum wall.

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3D Printing Powder Recovery System Cuts Material and Labor Costs

Application Notes & Case Studies /

Millburn, NJ — A new dust-tight, fully automated 3D-ReKlaimer Powder Recovery System for 3D Additive Manufacturing (AM) printing systems recovers and reconditions used powders to exacting particle sizes, reducing waste and lowering operating costs while preventing contamination of the product and plant environment.

The system can reclaim metal powders utilized in all current additive manufacturing technologies including Selective Laser Sintering (SLS), Binder Jetting, Direct Metal Laser Sintering (DMLS), Selective Laser Melting (SLM), Laser Powder Bed Fusion (LPBF), Laser Metal Fusion (LMF), and Electron Beam Melting (EBM). The metal powder recovery system is offered in custom configurations to suit any AM requirement.

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Rotary Batch Blending of Heavy Metal Powders

Application Notes & Case Studies /

Tumbling action benefits powdered metal application: The rotary mixers consist of a horizontal, rotating drum that has a stationary inlet at one end and a stationary outlet with a discharge gate at the other. The mixing vessel, which has no internal moving parts, is supported by two robust trunion rings, which ride on heavy-duty alloy roller assemblies. Material is loaded through the inlet chute while the drum is rotating.

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Integrating A Roll Compactor Into An Isolator

Application Notes & Case Studies /

A pharmaceutical clinical production application required both cGMP conditions and OEB 5 operator protection as high potency solids were being used in the process. The Fitzpatrick Company’s Contained Compaction System CCS320 was selected by the customer for the dry granulation operation stage due to its ability to achieve the desired capacity and particle size distribution. Although the CCS achieves OEB 3 & 4 containment levels with an on-board PCS system, in order to enhance the safety levels and reach OEB 4 & 5, further design solutions were needed.

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In-Line Dilute Phase Vacuum Conveying for Conical Screen Mills

Application Notes & Case Studies /

Conical Screen Mills (also referred to as Cone Mills) are gentle size reduction mills which are often used to precondition the material prior to its entry into a process, either by delumping or coarse size reduction. These mills utilize a rotating propeller/stationary screen combination to gently compress material against the screen wall and size the material accordingly. Vacuum conveying is often used to move material through the conical screen mill, help improve overall throughput of the process, contain dust or exposure, and also to assist in improvement of end product quality.

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