Food & Beverage
For food manufacturers, making a consistent product is an essential aspect of production.
A candy bar made by an international confectioner should taste the same in Detroit as in Dubai. The manufacturing process needs to preserve flavor and appearance and above all, maintain safety standards. Motion Solutions supports machine builders and end-users with a combination of quality food manufacturing equipment components and machine automation parts from reputable vendors and deep domain expertise from our engineering staff. Companies that build food and beverage manufacturing equipment have significant motion and automation expertise but they may need assistance to take their performance to the next level. They may want to find a way to lower the cost of subassemblies or simply outsource steps to free up their own engineers and technicians to focus on more food-centric tasks.
Industry Challenge
The food and beverage industry puts the focus squarely on safety—food safety, to be exact. Machine builders work with hygienic equipment that is designed to minimize contamination. Food and beverage manufacturing equipment needs to be stainless steel or another acceptable food-grade option. The designs need to avoid pitted surfaces or negative spaces that can permit liquids to pool and provide a growth area for oxidation and bacteria. Machine parts need to survive daily washdown with high pressure jets of water and caustic chemicals. Environmental conditions are likewise punishing with extremes of temperature and humidity.
The Motion Solutions Advantage
Food and beverage processing equipment standards are different from those found in other industries. The primary specifications call out a result—producing safe food—not the details of how to make that happen. As a result, it falls to the equipment builders to make sound choices in specifying their machines. Our knowledgeable sales force can help guide customers to the machine automation parts and components that can both deliver safe performance and survive harsh wash-down conditions.
We carry a broad portfolio of food-grade manufacturing machine components, many of which are IP69K rated to enable them to operate in washdown environments. Our safety-rated drives and PLCs support specialized functional safety operations such as Safe Direction and Safe Limited Speed. These support specialized cleaning and fault-recovery techniques that take less time than traditional methods while maintaining safe working conditions for personnel.
Our engineering services team can assist with the design, assembly, and manufacture of subsystems. Although food manufacturing equipment builders may have substantial motion expertise, our team brings a unique perspective that can help OEM engineers achieve a higher level of performance and reliability while offloading some of their assembly work.
Proven Solutions
Food processing and packaging expose automation equipment to punishing conditions such vibration, caustic chemicals, moisture, and acidic food products. Even food-grade motors frequently fail after just months. We have sought out food manufacturing and automation components designed specifically to survive these harsh environments. In particular, our portfolio includes motors with vent tubes and specialized seals that enable them to operate for years without failure. This increases productivity and reduces cost of ownership, both important for the low-margin food market.
Washdown doesn’t just take place in the processing plant and factory. We have expertise in food handling at the production end, as well. Operations in the fields and packing houses present particular challenges. Lettuce, for example, is put into what is essentially a large washing machine and sprayed while it is spinning to clean it. Here, the challenge is not just moisture and contamination but ongoing vibration. We can provide food manufacturing equipment, machine automation components and sub-assemblies that operate well even in these tough conditions.
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