Pinguin Foods has opted for new optical sorting technology from The Bühler Group, which will help it to achieve its goal of delivering fresh to frozen peas in just 150 minutes.
The new system has been installed at Pinguin’s 28 acre site in Norfolk, UK. Bühler is also helping to streamline the production process by ensuring that all foreign materials and defective products are removed quickly and efficiently, while helping to ensure the peas are as fresh as possible at the point of freezing.
The move will help Pinguin to satisfy the increasing demand for frozen food, as it supplies major multiple retailers including Marks & Spencer, Waitrose, Sainsbury’s and Tesco.
The Sortex optical sorters are designed to be used on production or packing lines, scanning and analysing the product, and using high definition cameras, broad spectrum lighting and infrared technology to detect and remove product with colour defects or blemishes, as well as foreign objects.
Pinguin operations director Neil Winner said: “Previously, the sorters used at the plant were only capable of a rejection rate of 15 good to one bad from the reject stream. Today, our range of Bühler Sortex optical sorters is operating at three to one, which gives us incredible cost benefits on yield. Our investment in Bühler technology has ensured all of our product is efficiently and effectively sorted.”
Buhler Sortex applications specialist David McCambridge said: “Our technology is not only looking for any colour or shape defects. By using Profile shape recognition, colour detection and enhanced InGaAs camera technology, we can simultaneously remove FM such as insects, wood, glass, stones, seeds or flower heads as well as snails, slugs and any other material which will render the product unacceptable. In addition, the optical sorters remove any EVM (extraneous vegetable matter) whether or not it is derived from the pea plant.”
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