Baking & Snack - November 2006 - 64

MATERIAL HANDLING

Importance of the

MINOR

Automation of minor and micro ingredients enables preparation
of product variations with consistent, repeatable results.

BY JENNIFER BARNETT FOX
onsumer tastes and trends continually evolve,
and with that evolution comes increasing demands on bakers to fill requests for new products. Trends such as whole grain and organic
as well as expanding product varieties dictate a need to
handle more minor ingredients in addition to the already
automated bulk ingredients. With issues such as traceability of ingredients added to specific batches and the
ergonomics of workers continuously handling 50- to
100-lb bags of minor ingredients, bakers are resolving
such concerns with ingredient handling equipment.
Because small amounts of ingredients can dictate the
success of a batch, the handling of micro and minor dry
and liquid ingredients requires increased accuracy and
flexible weighing systems. In addition, the repeatability of
scaling must be consistent. While ingredient handling is
not a new concept, customers are requesting equipment
that is self-checking along with automated calibration,
tracking and reporting. Today's systems offer self-checking instruments and load cells and automatic diagnostic
reports, which make maintenance less of an issue.

DELIVERING THE GOODS. Minor and micro ingredient
handling systems deliver dry materials primarily through
small-diameter tubular metering screws. An auger or
screw feeder is typically used for dry ingredients, while
more fragile components such as powders, granulates or
particulates use vibratory feeders. Standard dilute-phase
conveying can move a small amount of loosely grouped
product with a large amount of air. Dense-phase conveying, another method for moving materials that could be
damaged by too much contact with piping walls, pushes
"slugs" of ingredients along with small amounts of air.
Scaling bulk and major dry ingredients using the gainin-weight method gives the fastest discharge into the mixer, but only one ingredient at a time can be weighed. Mi-

nor and micro dry ingredients are typically portioned
by loss-in-weight systems,
which discharge or subtract
ingredients out of a scale. In
this method, the feeder is on
load cells, and the receiving
vessel is a collecting hopper. According to the vicepresident of engineering of
a European company with
US offices in the South, this
system allows pre-scaling of
all minor ingredients simultaneously into a common container, which is then unloaded into the mixer as opposed
to one material at a time, therefore allowing higher speed.
A European company with US offices located in the
southern Midwest offers a dosing feed screw that works
in conjunction with a live-bottom hopper. Because of the
minute amount of a micro ingredient, a large feeder will
make it difficult for a controller to cut off the feed quickly
enough, resulting in excess ingredient in the batch. In addition, when the ingredient is discharged, it's important
to ensure that the entire weight leaves the feeder.
A European company with offices in the southern
Midwest offers a box made of plastic or stainless steel for
minor and micro ingredients, which includes a built-in
dosing screw. Because the drive for the box is a part of
the scale, a separate drive motor isn't needed. This system
allows the changeout of minor and micro ingredients in
a plug-and-play manner, eliminating the cleaning of residue and the possibility of cross contamination.
In addition to an accurate feed device, an accurate scale is
also important. A strategic account executive from a company located in the central US advised placing the feeding device and scaling in close proximity to the ingredients, so there

ᮡ Micro ingredients are
efficiently gathered using
a row of small bulk bins
and a manual scale. To the
right of the hand-added
stations is a bag dump
station for the weighed
ingredients.
REIMELT

November 2006 / BAKING & SNACK / 67

http://www.scale.To

Baking & Snack - November 2006

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