Individualised Horizontal Slicing machine for fresh meat.
The cutting of products is an important energy-intensive process in food processing, which is used in various industries, including meat processing, and which is usually associated with a number of food losses. The market for horizontal cutting currently consists of inline machines that are mounted with a defined number of blades at a defined distance, a so-called "cutting pitch".
The lower belt of these machines represents the working base, and the upper belt pushes the product through the blades. The machine must be fine-tuned manually. Due to the varying size and shape of the product (typically chicken breast or turkey breast), a permanent optimization of the various cutting parameters would be necessary to achieve the best yield and quality. As a result, the fixed and mechanical configuration of the current horizontal cutting machines presents two main problems:
1. The impossibility of fine-tuning the cutting parameters during production, resulting in poorer cutting quality and in a difficult to control production;
2. The almost constant presence of a trim slice on the top, due to the difference between the height of the pressed product and the cutting pitch resulting in lower yields and lot of product residues.
KSL-DV is an automatic horizontal cutting machine for boneless meat, specially designed for poultry processing. Compared to the standard fixed-thickness horizontal cutting machines currently available on the market, the system is able to detect the size and shape of each incoming product and adjust the cutting process to maximize the yield and quality of the cut product. This is made possible by the use of a 3D scanner system to examine the product combined with specially developed software and by a patented blades movement system. This allows the machine to automatically decide how many blades (from 0 to 6) to be used as well as to adjust automatically the positions of the blades and those of the pressure parameters in order to minimize the unusable residues of the cutted product and, ideally, to achieve complete zero waste.
The control of the cutting movement by an electronic actuator allows easy modification of all cutting parameters during production in real time, so that each individual piece can be treated according to its individual cutting parameters and ultimately an average product yield of 96% to 98% can be achieved. The energy savings and the cleaner downstream handling process combined with a corresponding reduction in the risk of contamination and an improvement in the shelf life of the product are also decisive. The system is compatible with other standard machines and can therefore be easily integrated into existing production lines. In addition, by adapting the software, this cutting process can also be transferred to other product areas.
Discover KSL DV, winner of the International FoodTec Award 2024 from DLG. Visit us live at Anuga Foodtec in Cologne Hall 6.1 Stand E020 F029 from March 19-22.
To the press compartment of Grasselli S.p.A.
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