World-class processing systems demand high quality products, innovative features, and long-term yield increase, all of which have been delivered through superior workmanship, engineering, and the use of stainless steel.
ASSDA Member, INOX Australia, was engaged by a Melbourne based stock and soup manufacturer to design the integral process, fabricate, install, and commission a beef, chicken, seafood, and vegetable stock processing system. The processing system is entirely fabricated in stainless steel as it has been essential to the project design and fabrication, being the material of choice in demanding hygienic environments that involve high heat.
Exceeding their client’s expectations, INOX supplied a processing system that provided multiple innovative features, winning the 2019 Food & Beverage Industry ‘Innovative Technology of the Year’ Award, and being nominated for ASSDA’s 2019 Fabricator Project of the Year Award. This extraordinary processing system features a single user operational interface, safe and ergonomic handling of the product during the process from start to finish and hygienic design of the process including zero wastage at end of production. It also improved the yield of raw materials by pressure processing instead of traditional atmospheric process.
The system works by depositing 1000kg of raw materials into a stainless steel basket which is lifted by an electric hoist into the automatically opened pressure vessel. The touchscreen operational interface is used to set and supply the water volume. The process is fully automatic to the set parameters and then alarms when the process is completed. Following the cooking procedure, the CIP (Clean In Place) water is circulated through the heating jacket of the vessel which serves two purposes. The first is to cool the cooking vessel to a temperature that allows the product to be discharged, and the second, to use the heat recovered from the cooking vessel to heat up the cleaning water. This reusable use of heating allows for no external heating of the cleaning water.
The liquid stock produced is then pumped through a specially designed filtration system, to a holding tank which is then ready for the product to be received by the external filling line. The stainless steel basket is then removed from the vessel and the waste product is dumped into a hopper underneath the basket, ready to be removed to a disposable waste bin. The basket is then cleaned within the vessel during the CIP process and does not exit the food processing room at any point, ensuring the equipment is cleaned and cannot be contaminated externally.
An impressive 5000kg of 304 and 316L grade stainless steel was used to complete the project. All stainless steel material was supplied by ASSDA Members, Midway Metals, Vulcan Stainless and Tubesales Stainless. This included stainless steel tube, pipe, plate and sheet with 3mm to 12mm thickness. Several components (with thicknesses up to 75mm) required a large amount of specialised machining. The material was mechanically polished where required to achieve a better than 0.8 µm Ra surface finish. This superior material of choice meets the project’s sanitary requirements, offers structural integrity and excellent corrosion resistance in high temperature applications.
This article is featured in Australian Stainless Magazine issue 71, 2021.
