The new Roto-Batcher from Ishida Europe is the second model to be introduced into the company’s weigh batcher range.
According to the food packaging equipment specialist, Roto-Batcher combines the accurate weighing of fresh meat and poultry with manual manipulation to optimise their arrangement and presentation in trays.
The Roto-Batcher has been developed for sticky meat and poultry products that cannot be easily moved by feeder vibration, or for when manual product feeding is not economically viable.
Product is weighed automatically on Ishida’s Screw Feeder weigher, which features rotating metal spirals to provide a powerful, controlled and fully automatic product feed to the pool hoppers.
Each accurately-weighed portion is then despatched to one of the packing stations on the batching table, where an operator transfers it to a tray, styles it and places the tray on an ‘out’ belt for sealing, labelling and quality control.
The station automatically informs the system once the filled and styled tray has left, triggering the sending of another weighed item to be packed.
“Using eight operators, the system can deliver speeds of 55 trays per minute with an average giveaway of only 1 percent,” the company says.
A circular rotary batching table is positioned directly below the weigher, maximising the return on floor space.
According to Ishida Europe, an easy-clean design, fast speeds and minimal product giveaway mean that the new Roto-Batcher system can “reduce labour by up to 60% compared with an entirely manual operation”.
