Vision technology in volume biscuit production

The installation of laser camera scanning technology by Machine Vision Technology has yielded cost savings and greater process reliability for one Europe's leading biscuit manufacturers

Automatic and close control of length, width and height dimensions is ensuring that all products meet their necessary weight criteria.

At the same time the optimum balance and economy of ingredients is being obtained by precisely controlling content for the biscuits, their coatings and fillings.

Previously subject to manual sampling and dimension checking, the Machine Vision Technology system meets customer specification by measuring to within +/-1mm on length and width and +/-1.5mm on height for products typically up to 76mm long, 26mm wide and 6-9mm high.

One hundred percent inspection is now being achieved for high volume production rates of 170,000 items per hour!.

If required, MVT can develop and install systems capable of measuring to single micron accuracy.

The MVT system uses a laser scanner for measuring height, interpreted by four cameras, which also measure the length and width.

Thirty rows of cooked biscuits that pass underneath are scanned on a continuous conveyor travelling at 110 columns per minute.

Any product detected outside tolerances triggers an immediate, on-screen alarm message to the operator who can isolate under or overweight product and adjust process settings such as oven temperature.

A simple drop down menu allows the operator to change process parameters for product change-overs.

The customised front end of the software, specially developed by MVT, incorporates an average size display for measurements over the last 100 rows produced.

These statistics are stored against time and date to satisfy industry requirements for product traceability.

All process information is available on remote and duplicate screens for monitoring by production engineers.

All hardware structures, casings etc are produced in stainless steel, aluminium or are powder coated to comply fully with food industry standards.

Says MVT Sales Manager, Rick Marshall, "When the customer approached us to automate a biscuit weight control system, we had our 20 years of experience of vision technology to call on.

We can access any of the machine vision hardware on the market and apply our bespoke software capability to provide an optimum solution.

The key customer benefit on this project is that there is now 100% on-going inspection and, therefore, greater process control and reliability".

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