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Ishida Pick-and-Place Packer Maxmises Line Speeds For Trays

15/11/2004

Established in 1945, Hitchen Foods is one of the UK’s leading suppliers of added value vegetable and salad based products to the major multiple retailers and food service sector. Today the company’s chefs prepare over 100,000 meals each day.

With speed and efficiency vital in the production and despatch of fresh produce, the Hitchen Foods factory features a number of high-speed processing and packing lines. However, while the line dedicated to ready prepared potatoes was able to operate at 45 packs per minute, packing the filled trays into euro crates was a physical impossibility at this speed.

“Before the installation of the Ishida FPS, we were packing by hand but even if we had wanted to dedicate more personnel to the task, there simply wasn’t room for more than two people at the end of the line,” explains Ged Warburton, the company’s Engineering Manager.

“The only solution in order to be able to maintain line speed was to automate the end of line packing process.”

Following a visit to the PPMA Show and a review of the options available, the company selected the Ishida FPS for its simplicity of operation.

“We were impressed by the speed and efficiency of the machine and the fact that it did not require any specialist training to operate it,” says Mr Warburton.

The FPS features an agile, multi-axis pick-and-place arm with a vacuum pick up head that picks up two trays at a time and transfers them into a euro crate. The flexibility of the system means that it was initially able to handle eight different tray shapes and sizes, including both round and rectangular versions. Ishida and Hitchen Foods also devised a special system to enable layer cards to be inserted into the crates as required by one retailer.

Today the packing requirements have been simplified to two tray sizes, producing a wide variety of packs for different retailers, packed into full and half size euro crates. Half size crates are presented broad edge leading, enabling two of them to be filled at the same time.

Individual requirements for each pack are programmed into the FPS’ Remote Control Unit, so that product changeovers can be carried out at the touch of a button. Ishida Europe also installed a gated infeed conveyor to present the euro crates and a take-away roller track conveyor.

“The FPS has been very well received by the operators on the factory floor, it has proved highly reliable and we have been impressed with Ishida’s high standards of service and support,” says Ged Warburton.

The FPS is operating 16 hours per day Monday to Friday plus weekends.

“The fact that the machine has been able to run reliably and consistently throughout has been its main benefit and brought about a fast payback on our investment,” concludes Mr Warburton.