More than six metres long, the new bespoke Sapphire x-ray system can handle bags of pet food kibble up to one metre in length and weighing up to 25kg, inspecting at a rate of 800 bags an hour.
Our Largest Ever X-ray System, New Deal With GA Pet Food Partners
We are pleased to announce a new deal with GA Pet Food Partners to create our largest ever x-ray inspection machine. More than six metres long, the bespoke x-ray system (pictured) can handle bags of pet food kibble weighing up to 25kg and measuring up to one metre in length lying flat, inspecting at a rate of 800 bags an hour.
The new inspection machine will be the latest addition to the GA Pet Food Partners state-of-the-art manufacturing facility at Leyland in Lancashire, which produces 80,000 tonnes of dry pet food each year. The site is already home to eight other Sapphire innovations, including a G40 X-ray inspection and weight checking machine, which can handle upright bags of various sizes up to 4kg, at a rate of 1,800 an hour.
“As one of the largest independent manufacturers of private label pet food in Europe, we handle 700 different recipes and 2,500 different pack formats – so it’s a challenge to find inspection equipment that can cope with that. Sapphire has the expertise to create bespoke solutions for us that fully integrate with our own systems to provide a high level of process control and, in turn, reassurance for our own customers about the quality of every bag of their products.”
Andy Kettle, GA Petfood Partners
As well as ensuring the pet food bags are free of contaminants (such as fragments of metal, stone, or glass), the machine will also check the weight of each bag to make sure it contains exactly the right amount of kibble. All x-ray images will be stored with a timestamp on the GA Pet Food Partners server, enabling easy identification of a specific item.
Sapphire founder Richard Parmee said: “Our broad range of more than 40 X-ray inspection machines can cope with the challenges posed by the vast majority of food, pharmaceutical and cosmetics production lines. But it was clear from the start that the latest innovative request from GA Pet Food Partners was going to need our unique bespoke approach to create our largest ever machine that can seamlessly integrate into the factory’s existing systems to ensure every product is of the same high standard.”
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