MU 2018 March April

52 MACHINERY UPDATE MARCH/APRIL 2018 www.machineryupdate.co.uk
Feature: Ready meals
Greencore invests
in more inspection
kit for pasta lines
Greencore knows about
ready meals and it knows
about keeping them safe.
The group produces
180 million chilled
prepared meals and meal kits
globally each year and at its
Warrington site, it produces ready
meals for its multiple retailer
customers which makes food
safety a top priority.
The site continues to expand to
meet increased volume demand
which is why it is ordering more
high speed metal detection systems
from Metal Detection Services
(MDS). These twin headed systems
will be running on the high speed,
ready meal pasta lines at up to
120 packs a minute and joins other,
previously installed machinery.
Following successful trials
against competitor equipment
a few years’ ago, MDS first won
the contract to install inspection
equipment at this Greencore site.
That project saw seven, twin
headed systems comprising
14 conveyor-mounted detector
heads. These heads are both
ferrous in foil and MS21 multi
spectrum technology and are all
designed and built to the latest
retailer codes of practice.
IMPROVED SENSITIVITY
“The MS21 multi spectrum
metal detector can use multiple
frequencies simultaneously, giving
it an advantage over conventional
multi frequency detectors which
only use one of their available
frequencies at any one time,” says
David Hale of MDS. “This means
the MS21 can deliver an improved
sensitivity giving it a much greater
ability to find small irregularly
shaped contamination,” he says.
Before commissioning, factory
acceptance tests were carried out
at CEIA’s facility in Italy, where the
units were built, before they were
shipped to the Greencore site in the
UK. At the time, four project staff
from Greencore, headed by project
managers Neil Greenfield and
Protecting
reputation
Greencore
produces
180 million chilled
prepared ready
meals and also
meal kits globally
each year
Jon Bremner travelled to the Italian
site to work with David Hale and
Pete Higgins of MDS.
The systems installed then
increased detection rates at the
site, which is why the company
has come back for more. Indeed,
Greencore has identified that
the level of detection of ferrous
materials and other contaminants
has increased dramatically since
using the CEIA technology when
compared to previous equipment.
“Greencore has been able to reduce
its test stick size by more than
half with this new technology,”
The test stick size has now
been reduced by more than half
explains Hale.
“We are delighted with the
functionality and performance
of the CEIA metal detectors,”
said Jon Bremner, continuous
improvements co-ordinator
at Greencore.
“The introduction of these
cutting-edge detectors ensures
that Greencore Warrington is
using the latest technology
available to exceed our customers’
requirements for the detection
of metal contamination,”
he continues. “Both our technical
team and our operators are
impressed by how simple and
user friendly the detectors are
to set up and operate, despite
their incredible performance.”
T 0161 286 8750
W www.mds.org.uk