The Brief
In the modern world that we live in, pumping and depositing food into ready meal trays or sauces onto pizza bases may seem like a simple task. With production demands rising and increasingly varied, what happens when this automated process no longer produces the results or coverage to meet this increase?
The answer 8 out of 10 times, ready meal food producers come up with is by employing staff to manually manipulate the sauce deposited. Helping to achieve the coverage or spread required. However, thinking long-term this can have a huge financial impact on the business, and is a very labour-intensive process. That is where the team at Euroflow Automation come in.
For this project, we worked with one of the UK’s largest ready meal food producers, in order to combat the issue of increased demand and ongoing labour costs. The customer also wanted to retain their existing machinery, which meant we had to design and manufacture a bespoke solution to seamlessly integrate with their existing volumetric depositor.
The Solution
At Euroflow Automation we always try very hard to come up with a solution to the problems our clients are facing. Working in hand with our client, we designed and engineered a bespoke range of sauce depositing heads manufactured from 316 Grade stainless steel (meeting food-grade standards) and high-density food-grade plastic which seamlessly integrated with their existing depositors.
Once we had designed and engineered the volumetric depositing heads, we carried out extensive internal testing using the ingredient provided by the client. The sauce depositing heads distributed the food/sauce into the ready meal tray or onto the pizza base accordingly, and at the target weight and spread required without human intervention.
The machine then underwent a Factory Acceptance Test. Once approved the volumetric depositing head was integrated into our client’s existing production line. Labour that had once been employed to manipulate the ingredient was reallocated elsewhere within the business, to a more important role.
By intelligently designing and skillfully engineering this solution for our client, they forecasted generating a sub 3-month Return on Investment!
Euroflow also design and manufacture a range of fully automated, high-quality volumetric depositors that reliably and consistently deposit liquids or food. Our sauce depositors are heavy-duty, dependable machines that are designed and engineered for long and varied shift productions.
Our volumetric depositors are widely used across the following sectors: food, pharmaceutical, cosmetic and chemical. So if this is something that would be of use within your processing line, contact the team at Euroflow Automation today to discuss your individual requirements.
