Bottle-drying system minimises contamination risks
An
Air Control Industries product story
Edited by the Engineeringtalk editorial team
Feb 13, 2009
Air Control Industries (ACI) has revealed how a bottle-drying system it supplied to Bitburger Braugruppe is helping the brewer minimise contamination risks on production-line machinery.
A speciality of Bitburger Braugruppe is the brewing of non-pasteurised Pils beer and this calls for the highest hygiene standards.
One precaution the company takes to achieve these standards is to minimise the presence of crevices and projections on machinery involved on the production line that could serve as catchment zones and create possible contamination risks.
ACI has supplied a bottle-drying system to Bitburger built specially to comply with these standards.
Essentially, the bottle dryer is one of ACI's low-noise, high-throughput units that has been adapted to meet the demanding hygiene requirements.
All meeting surfaces, which are normally spot-welded or bolted together, have seamless welded joins in order to facilitate cleaning and eliminate bacteria build up.
There is also a special drainage facility for directing moisture to appropriate outlets.
In addition, the housing for the blower (ACI's EP10) that delivers the air is mounted on top of the dryer instead of underneath.
This is to permit easy cleaning under the dryer.
Although the ACI drier is a low-noise unit, it does not contain any acoustic foam, which could absorb moisture and breed germs.
Instead, the machine is equipped with noise baffles at both the entry and exit points.
Noise levels are just below 85dBA.
The ACI bottle dryer is installed on a line that replaces two previous ones and handles a throughput of 50,000 bottles/hr.
The dryer provides a cost-effective solution compared to the options considered, which included manufacturing one in-house, as the previous machines had been.
Currently, the bottles passing through the ACI dryer are standard 330ml ones, but it is expected other sizes will be produced on the line.
The drying function is achieved by high volumes of air being delivered at close proximity to the bottles via the company's Jetplate plenums and a pair of Airknives, all housed in a stainless-steel cabinet.
The unit has a footprint of 990 x 1680mm with an overall height of 2070mm.
In another application, faced with increasing demand from home and overseas, O'Hanlon's Brewery of Devon needed to increase output.
Production of the company's beers was not a problem but getting the product out of the door was.
The inhibiting factor was O'Hanlon's bottling/labelling operation.
Condensation caused delays because frequently filled bottles had to be left to dry before labels could be applied.
This limited production to around 2,700 bottles/day.
Another issue arising from condensation and exacerbating time delays was double handling.
Bottles, once filled, were sometimes removed from the filling/labelling line and then reintroduced when dry for labelling.
However, the problems caused by condensation are no longer an issue for O'Hanlon's Brewery.
They have been eliminated following the installation of a pair of ACI's Airknives.
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Contact Air Control Industries
Tel (UK) 0845 5000 501
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