A day in the food industry The Variohm Group comprises several companies that have pooled knowledge of their individual disciplines while continuing to operate independently as specialists in their fields. Variohm Group supplies many industries, including the food industry, as we will see in this article. Heason offers some products that are already successfully used in this demanding industry. Ingredient mixing and filling In this scenario, we are in a production facility that makes canned soups. This involves accurate filling dosages into cans as well as mixing and agitating ingredients to strict recipes. As an example here, mixing paddles need to be lowered into the mixing vat and the product then mixed for a set speed, temperature and time to give end product consistency. Here, Heason can offer brushless closed-loop controlled motors for the stirring operation as well as electro-mechanical linear actuators to lower and raise the stirring paddles. An electro-mechanical linear actuator would be preferred over, say, a hydraulic actuator to greatly reduce the chances of introducing contaminants such as hydraulic oil into the food product. An actuator is clean and very cost effective from an installation and maintenance point of view. Linear actuators convert rotary motion from a motor into linear motion via a linear ballscrew or using a belt drive. They can have extending “piston” rods or be more line linear slides depending on the requirement. Linear motion is now completely controllable in terms of position, speed, acceleration and deceleration. We can also accurately control the linear force applied by the actuator. This is desirable for accurate and repeatable, yet adjustable dosing/filling. Both motors and actuators can be supplied with washdown and food safe coatings as well as full 316L stainless steel construction to meet strict food industry standards with up to IP69K ingress rating. Product labelling Food product labelling is an area where Heason can offer cost effective solutions. From high-speed synchronization of cans with labeling heads while moving through rotating carousels. Here we can offer full closed loop servo control as well as our electrical slipring technology to transmit power, signals and fieldbus through a rotating joint. We can also feed air, fluid or fiber-optics through the same slipring. We can offer sliprings with IP65 ingress protection. The article is part of a series: Variohm: A day in aircraft building Limitor: A day in the production of household appliances Herga: A day in the metalworking industry Positek: A day on a construction site Article published on: 22/02/2023 Article last updated on: 22/02/2023