TOMRA Sorting Food will showcase two sorting machines to almond growers and processors at this year’s Almond Conference.
The sensor-based sorting systems company will demonstrate its Nimbus 1200 BSI free-fall sorting machine, which provides a combination of technologies, and the Ixus Bulk X-ray sorter at the event.
The Almond Board Convention takes place at the Sacramento Convention Center, California, from 9-11 December.
TOMRA, which is this year’s conference silver sponsor, will be exhibiting at booth 433.
TOMRA’s ground-breaking BSI technology works by detecting the biometric characteristics of almonds and their defects. It scans and compares them to features in its stored database to decide whether almonds should be accepted or rejected.
TOMRA Sorting Food sales manager Darren Murphy said: "The BSI technology makes the Nimbus an ideal pre-sorting machine for almond processors. The increased options it provides also enhance the system’s ability to operate in other areas of production lines. It’s now the perfect re-sort or recycle unit for increasing yield, by minimising good product loss.
"In addition, the BSI module detects even smaller defects than conventional spectral technology and allows the Nimbus to be used effectively for normal or reverse sorts – the latter involving sound produce, rather than faulty material, being ejected."
A further benefit of the Nimbus is the machine’s light source, incorporating TOMRA’s patent pending flying-beam principle. This enables processors to use scan shields, to counter factors such as dust, efficiently and keeping the inspection windows clean.
He said the Nimbus BSI therefore offers user benefits including enhanced sorting quality, achieved with a reduced number of passes. The system also delivers higher throughput, yield and uptime, plus lower breakage levels and power consumption. It also saves on labour time, maintenance and costs.
Darren Murphy added: "The BSI module can be a stand-alone inspection platform or used in combination with lasers on one single Nimbus frame, as all the machine’s previous attributes are still available. This illustrates that, rather than thinking in terms of ‘standard’ machines, we recommend all food processors to share their individual requirements with us. This enables us to provide customised solutions, tailor-made for each particular need, as all our machines are fully modular and offer many feature combinations."
TOMRA says its Ixus Bulk X-ray sorter provides the safest solution for customers’ brand protection by implementing the latest X-ray and imaging technology. The Ixus guarantees the effective individual air blast removal of single or embedded dense foreign materials in a bulk flow of product.
In addition to almonds, the sorter is highly effective with a wide variety of other nuts and dried fruits including walnuts, pistachios, raisins and prunes.
Customer benefits of the Ixus Bulk include superior safety, minimised yield loss, ease of integration into existing processing lines, flexibility and unparalleled throughput.
