Ishida multihead weighers key to Aviko’s boost in production output
Aviko Germany has been working at full capacity to meet the demand for frozen fries from retailers and food service after replacing weighing systems with Ishida’s multihead weighers.
Aviko Germany produces frozen potato products from fresh potatoes at its site in Rain, Bavaria. Around 40t of the yellow tubers are processed every hour, the vast majority of them into French Fries, the rest into wedges and fried potatoes. Such huge production volumes require high-performance packaging systems.
Aviko’s production facility has eight Ishida multihead weighers available for this purpose, which are set up next to each other in an impressive phalanx. The machines weigh the frozen potato products for packaging in bags with fill weights from 450g to 2.5kg. This means that the weigher/bagmaker systems are fully utilised and run in 24/7 operation.
“To increase output, we began gradually replacing the existing multihead weighers with new machines in 2023,” reports Stefan Leuker, head of maintenance. Since then, three of the ageing weighers have been replaced by models from Ishida’s high-performance CCW-RV series and further orders have already been placed.
The newly installed multihead weighers from the CCW-RV series have significantly increased performance at Aviko. For example, when filling French fries into 450g bags, the manufacturer can run up to 70 packs per minute (ppm) instead of 50 ppm with the previous models. The frozen chips are fed from above onto the dispersion table of each 14-head weigher and are then transferred by 14 vibratory feeders precisely to the pool and weigh hoppers.
Five-stage digital filtering of the weighing signal shortens the settling time of the hoppers so that a maximum number of them can be used for the next calculation. The software determines the three best combinations in a weighing cycle, checks them again and selects the one that comes closest to the target weight. This enhances weighing accuracy and consistency and guarantees consistent high speeds. But the high-speed operation is by no means at the expense of weighing accuracy: according to Stefan Leuker, a 2.5kg bag is only overfilled by 5g. To put this into perspective: this value corresponds roughly to the weight of a single frozen chip.
The new multihead weighers from Ishida are not only fast and accurate, but also extremely robust.
“Unlike our old weighers, vibrations from the production environment do impact on weighing accuracy,” says Leuker. The CCW-RV series features Ishida’s proprietary anti-floor-vibration (AFV) System. To protect the loadcells, this technology compensates for any external vibrations to maintain the highest weighing accuracy. At each of the four corners of the weigher’s main body, loadcells measure the external floor vibrations. Clever software then filters out the effects of these vibrations on the weight calculations.
Aviko also benefits from rapid product changeovers, which take place several times a week using presets. Settings for new products can be configured conveniently using the automatic set-up function. Even the fortnightly wet cleaning process causes only minimal downtime. All components, including the drive units, are protected to IP69K, thus the weighers can be cleaned quickly with high-pressure and steam jet equipment. Sloping surfaces allow liquids to run off and the machines to dry quickly.
The CCW-RV weighers also stand out due to their very low energy consumption. At full capacity, the machines consume around 20 percent less power than conventional multihead weighers. In addition, economical operating modes “Half Power” and “Eco Mode” can be selected, which further reduce consumption by up to 50%.
Stefan Leuker: “The machines are proving to be energy savers and that, of course, comes in handy during audits.”
“With our new Ishida multihead weighers, we are able to pack a far greater product volume and meet the increasing market demand. Overall, we are very satisfied with the machines,” says Stefan Leuker.
Aviko expects the amortisation period to be two and a half years.
