Loss-In-Weight System Controls Lime Dispersion In Snack Food Production

Vibra Screw, Inc., a leading manufacturer of equipment and systems for precision processing of dry bulk materials, is offering a new Case History No. C-269 describing how a major snack food manufacturer uses Loss-in-Weight Feeders to control line dispersion in production of corn-based products.The manufacturer had been adding a small but precise amount of lime to the kettle feed stream by hand to soften and remove skins from corn kernels prior to processing and cooking. Since lime tends to settle and not stay suspended, the manual operation resulted in lumping and balling in the kettle along with wide accuracy fluctuations in a process that requires extremely critical ratios of lime to corn.Vibra Screw’s feed system incorporates a loss-in-weight screw feeder with a vibrated hopper, horizontal flexible screw auger and PLC controls for loss-in-weight operation. The system intermittently feeds 50 lbs. of lime to approximately 300 lbs. of corn per batch usually twice per hour for approximately four minutes per batch – a small but evenly distributed amount of lime. With each corn kernel evenly coated in the feed stream, lumping and lime settling have been completely eliminated.Vibra Screw introduced the concept of controlled vibration to condition and drive bulk materials into and through a process more than 40 years ago. Today they manufacture the broadest line of equipment incorporating this feature including bin activators, bulk bag unloaders, volumetric screw and belt feeders, and all types of graimetric feeds, blenders, and controls.