Trac-it MES in ready meal manufacture

MES specialists Marco have installed a ground breaking factory wide solution for Rannoch Food Group at their newly commissioned Cucina Sano plant near Boston in Lincolnshire

The Marco' Trac-it MES system provides complete control and management for the manufacturing site, from goods-in receipt through manufacture to packaging and on to despatch.

Cucina Sano (literally Italian for 'healthy kitchen') is part of the Rannoch Food Group and the facilities are capable of producing high quality, hand-crafted salads, deli products and ready meals.

The tempting, mouth-watering array of products provided to Marks and Spencer includes their 'Food to Go', 'Med Deli', 'Prepared Salad' and 'Vegetable' ranges, which bring new levels of sophistication and consumer enjoyment to the ready meal concept.

Despite rapid increases in automation there is still a high level of manual assembly dependence in these sectors and as retail outlets become more adventurous with their product offerings, the demands on suppliers increase.

Controlling and tracking the complex ingredient routings and their metamorphoses in real time is a challenging, yet imperative task in order to optimise quality, productivity, profitability and traceability.

Marco have turned this whole process of control and tracking into a highly choreographed art form, where Trac-it MES is both conductor and prima donna.

Trac-it MES, in parallel with continuous policing of the process that produces information on demand, has enabled the factory management team to remove traditional conceptual barriers and bring a new dimension to every part of high quality ready meal manufacture.

Twelve DataMaster terminals at strategic locations form the control framework, acting as the data management hub for each critical area.

Weighing plays a pivotal role throughout the process and the capture of real time weight data is used to maximum effect by the Trac-it MES system, whether it be from weighing incoming goods, calculating cooking losses, portion control during assembly or check- weighing at the end of the lines.

From the time a specific meal order requirement is initiated, all the Cucina Sano factory operations, including the ingredient assembly, recipe build-up, packaging and despatch processes, are driven and controlled by Trac-it MES.

There is no independent ERP or MRP system in operation at present and at the appropriate time the requisite interface will be implemented by the Marco Systems team.

Cucina products are typically a blend of fresh and pre-cooked ingredients together with sauces and dressings as appropriate.

As soon as a finished product order hits the Trac-it MES system, a complete BOM (Bill of Materials) requisition 'explodes' backwards, taking into account which products are needed (including packaging), the related processes they need to go through, even down to the 'fine' detail of whether dry products need sieving, together with when and where they are required on the factory floor.

For instance, if any sauces are needed from the recipe room, or cooked products from the kitchen, then the system will ensure these are processed and made available at the pre-requisite time and location.

It is quite common for several orders for different products to be going through simultaneously.

In this situation, the system automatically looks for common process and ingredient denominators and then where appropriate combines the requirements to optimise key processes such as cooking and recipe make up.

Stepping back a stage, Trac-it MES starts its work in earnest at Goods-in.

On any day the DataMaster terminal at this location knows what deliveries are expected and as they arrive, the goods are checked, weighed as required and labelled according to location and use by date.

The traceability chain has begun, stock levels are automatically upgraded and every time product is moved, processed or scrapped, bar code scanners 'catch the moment' and the system is updated.

Recipe management for products such as sauces and dressings is controlled via a triple scale DataMaster in the wet weigh and mixing room.

The 6kg, 30 kg and 300 kg weighing range capability ensures ingredients with widely varying target weights can be weighed with the same proportional precision at one location.

For certain products, cooking is an important part of the manufacturing cycle and Trac-it MES monitors these throughout this process.

Materials such as peppers and aubergines are loaded into the ovens on uniquely coded racks.

Weighing before and after the cooking process, and then again after blast chilling, provides essential data on usable ingredient weight and yield loss.

As the different ingredients and sauces arrive at their designated production line, bar code scanning confirms whether all the components for a particular product run have been correctly assembled.

There are currently five assembly lines, fitted with 40 LineMaster portion control scales operating in 'takeaway' mode and connected via secure RF links to the central Editor PC.

The LineMaster has been specifically developed for high speed manual assembly of meals and its simple, yet highly effective, 16 segment coloured bar graph immediately gives a clear indication of whether the amount of product added to the tray is over, under or within weight tolerance.

The operators soon 'tune in' to such visual systems and simply pack to the 'green light' without having to think about the actual weights.

This system is 'language transparent' making it ideal for multi-national operators.

Products must maintain both nutritional values and correct ingredient ratios underpinned by pack target weights, which must be in line with the Packers Code for 'e' weighing.

However individual components can vary considerably, affecting final product composition.

To overcome this Marco have pioneered their automatic optimisation (AO) program.

This ingenious piece of software runs quietly in the background, constantly evaluating weight data from the in-line checkweighers and individual LineMaster stations.

This data is then used to automatically adjust the priority ingredient target settings at selected LineMaster stations.

This constant, real time, feed back loop continually monitors and adjusts the targets for pre-designated ingredients, maintaining nutritional balances according to the built-in algorithm.

The subtle changes in target weights are transparent to the operators and maintain a strict nutritional content of the products, whilst reducing giveaway to almost zero.

Full data capture of each and every weighment ensures compliance with Average Weight Legislation and provides full electronic traceability.

For any particular product, the system automatically calculates the expected line speeds in packs per minute and then during assembly updates the system with the actual speeds being achieved.

Large 42inch plasma efficiency screens at the end of each line give up to the minute information on how any particular line is progressing in terms of productivity and target weights.

After each particular run, any material discrepancies in terms of over-quantities are recorded and where appropriate, in-line with strict guidelines, material can be booked back into stock.

After sealing and labelling, the finished products come out of high care into the despatch and collation area.

During this transition, label verifier scanners check finished bar codes to ensure that the correct product is in the pack.

Prior to palletising, products are now loaded into dedicated Marks and Spencer trays fitted with Intellident RFID tags.

Trac-it MES interfaces with the Intellident system giving information regarding the UPC, description, destination depot and how many units should make up the order.

As Cucina Sano IT/IS manager Jon Purbrick concludes: "Our working environment is dynamic to say the least and requirements can change rapidly.

Marco and Trac-it MES have been able to respond to this in a timely and efficient manner.

This now enables us to use real time data to aid the management decision making process.

In addition, the lot traceability function means we can confidently identify the exact stock movement for any item through the factory, from Goods In to the final packed product.

As an added control, our QA team can now create user defined checks at any part of the process via a PDA linked into the overall system.

For instance authorised personnel can accept/reject/quarantine deliveries at goods-in for specified reasons, posting comments as appropriate".

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