PIAB Vacuum Conveyors Provide Hygienic and Cost-Effective Sugar Handling Solution for Weetabix
23 April 2007 16:31
Weetabix Canada, a leading manufacturer of Ready-To-Eat (RTE) cereals for over 100 cereal brands sold in Canada, Great Britain, and the United States, recently improved material handling efficiency with the use of a sanitary, maintenance-free vacuum conveying system from PIAB, a global leader in industrial vacuum technology. The ultra-quiet conveying system is used to quickly and safely transport granulated sugar on one of Weetabix's cereal coating lines.
Weetabix Canada, a subsidiary of Weetabix Ltd, processes recipes for nearly one hundred brands of cereals for the Canadian, American and British markets. One of Weetabix Canada's recent innovations came in the way of a private-label customer, whose recipe included a proprietary mix of sugar-coated flakes. In order to best fulfil its customer's needs, Weetabix decided to automate material-handling processes at its manufacturing plant in Cobourg, Ontario.
Specifically, Weetabix wanted to replace its existing manual method, which was a laborious process that required workers to lift extremely heavy sacks, filled with granulated sugar, and pour them into the blender where the sugar was then mixed with water.
"With the existing method, our employees had to manually lift and carry the bags," said Al Cane, engineering project coordinator, a 25-year Weetabix veteran in charge of plant operations. "This was a time-consuming and labour-intensive process and also created a situation where workers could hurt their backs lugging around these heavy loads."
PIAB CUSTOM VACUUM CONVEYING SYSTEM WITH TRANSITION PIECES
In order to automate the existing process, Cane partnered with Ron Hull, an executive at Weetabix's automation distributor, George T White, a leading provider of automated industrial solutions. To most efficiently automate Weetabix's sugar handling application, Hull recommended that Cane install a sanitary, stainless-steel pneumatic conveyor from PIAB. As PIAB's exclusive representative in Ontario, the George T White Company regularly works with manufacturers to install PIAB's conveyors in challenging bulk material handling applications.
"PIAB's custom conveying solutions help our customers raise productivity on a regular basis," said Hull. "They are ideal for applications that demand the highest possible degree of safety as to hygiene and operation."
Among the most pressing issues was how to ensure that the granulated sugar was moved efficiently without getting stuck in the conveying system from exposure to steam from the hot water, which later mixes with the sugar and 'frosts' the cereal flakes.
Due to the complex nature of the application, Weetabix required custom connecting points and controls to smoothly and safely transfer the product to the coating line. "This application was challenging because it required a unique transition piece to allow steam to vent prior to going up the discharge piping. The goal was to prevent the sugar from crystallising and sticking to the dump valve of the conveyor. I was confident in PIAB's ability to provide the necessary transition pieces that Weetabix required," said Hull.
SAFE AND EFFECTIVE SUGAR CONVEYANCE
Cereal coating is a cumbersome process which requires several stages, one of the first of which begins when the granulated sugar is delivered to the plant in large super sacks. The sacks are then placed on fork lifts where they are picked up by a hoist that hangs the sacks over the feed station, where the sugar is dumped from an opening at the bottom of the sacks. At the bottom of the feed station is a feed adapter which connects to the vacuum conveyor where vacuum is generated by a compressed air-driven PIAB vacuum pump.
Vacuum draws the sugar through a vacuum line about 30 feet into a vacuum receiver, which is a batch cycling system. From the receiver, the sugar is discharged into a blender filled with hot water. The sugar mixes with the hot water and the mixture is moved to next stage of the processing line to coat the flakes.
In order to prevent the steam from coming up from the blender and causing the sugar to crystallize and stick on the bottom valve, Ron Hull worked with Al Cane to come up with a customized solution that included a transition piece from PIAB. Hull designed the piece so that it fit properly between the vacuum receiver and the blender. The transition piece allows the sugar to flow freely from the conveyor, but keeps the steam from entering and causing the sugar to coat and stick to the dump valve.
"An extra module was also installed to raise the filter above the inlet to prevent the sugar from contacting the filter and thus causing abrasive damage. It also preserves the life of the filter and thus reduces downtime because regular filter replacements are needed less often," said Hull.
SAFE, ERGONOMIC AND COST-EFFECTIVE FOOD-HANDLING
By installing the automated conveying system, Weetabix has now eliminated any unnecessary bending, lifting, and other movements that could be detrimental to its employees. "We were able to reassign one of our full-time workers to a more productive task, realizing a cost savings of eight hours per day," said Cane.
Cane has also welcomed the lack of maintenance issues. "We schedule a preventive maintenance check once every three months, and that heads off any possible problems and keeps the conveyors running smoothly. Our employees appreciate the fact that it is simple to operate and requires almost no repairing."
Reliability and sanitary design have proved to be particularly beneficial for easy compliance with food industry regulations. "The conveyors are very dependable, well-designed and extremely clean. Our inspectors like the fact that the system eliminates almost all risk of contamination."
The success of the conveying system has prompted Weetabix to purchase additional systems for other bulk material handling applications.
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PIAB - Vacuum Conveyors
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