Automated Food Assembly Network and Food Manufacturing Engineering Group

August 08

Anonymous writes "
IMPLEMENTING GOOD AUTOMATION FOR SUSTAINABILITY & QUALITY IN FOOD MANUFACTURING
For The Joint Meeting of the Food Manufacturing Engineering Group and The Automated Food Assembly Network
HELD AT THE BRADGATE BAKERY, LEICESTER,
Tuesday 1st July 2008
Implementing good automation for sustainable, quality food manufacturing: view from an end user -by Mike Mountain, Samworth Brothers outlined the company's activities and production requirements. He outlined existing automation and robotics at the company. He raised the following reservations: cost, customer order changes and delisting, time to changeover, space, requirements for skilled engineers and quality for vision systems.
Implementing good automation for a sustainable food industry: view from an automation supplier by Alan Spreckley, Channel Partner Manager, ABB Robotics UK. Implementation requires the creation of trust, looking for a simple solution, understanding obstacles and overcoming them and not implying false payback expectations. Automation will protect your workforce, allow redeployment on greater throughput and improve quality. Benefits of automation include labour savings, reduced sickness, overcoming existing and potential labour shortages, secondary savings on induction costs, higher efficiency and less waste. Benefits must be quantified, robots have a high residual value and repetitive strain injuries are avoided.

Creating Structure from Disarray - an EPSRC supported project to support Food Automation, by Dr Graham Purnell, FRPERC University of Bristol. The underlying idea is to optimise automation by providing the best structural input. Staff manually handle produce to put them in the correct orientation for processing. The project seeks to study the manipulation of produce in one, two or three dimensions. The project will study difficult products with a multidisciplinary approach to meet industrial need. The project is joint with Kings College London where the mathematical models will be formulated, Bristol will work on sensors and end effectors. Factors studied will include whether produce is symmetrical or uniform, material properties such as stickiness, rotations, layers and categories. The intention is to optimise sensors, grippers and end effectors, create CAD models and dynamic simulations on how to feed the product into the equipment. Industrial visits are sought. The project has some industrial partners including Manor Bakeries.
'Grail Robot' A small, flexible, affordable robot for the food industry, Geoff Pegman, R U Robots, Manchester. The intention of this project is to produce a flexible robot, that can be used in a production line, where there is limited space in an industry where there are orders not contracts. The specification is exacting for a robust robot with low guarding and sensor driven. The robot will have to accommodate frequent changes, with produce of high variability. It will operate at slow speed as it will be operating alongside people and will be lightweight and so use less energy.. The project has been approved by DeFRA but further industrial partners are sought.
Centre for Food Robotics and Automation - progress and future plans, Dr Stephen Fitzpatrick, Manager, Yorkshire Forward The aim of the Centre is to support a sustainable food processing industry by introducing automation. Cheap labour is disappearing, 18% of the employment in Yorkshire is in food processing with 1,100 companies. The sector is showing growth of 12% per annum. CenFRA is an independent, not- for-profit company. It is funded by Yorkshire Forward £2.7 million and launched on 22 May 2008. It is based in Doncaster. It is seeking solutions to problems, increased efficiency and sharing ideas. It is not about building equipment or installing robots. The company board is drawn from industry and a technical advisory group has been formed. It will undertake horizon scanning and promote automation across the UK and in Europe. The Centre will raise awareness of the benefits of automation, provide free automation audits and independent advice on equipment.
DVDs are available and it is intended to have NVQ to degree training in automation. The remit includes identification of generic issues and research topics, production simulation, product manipulation, identification of pinch points, precision, programming changes andoperator upskilling. The RDA can support academic research with service agreements with Universities.
Security of Food Supplies - how will this affect automation? Jose Spring, FMEG
UN states that world food production needs to increase by 50% by 2030 to meet demand (FAO). Population is estimated to peak at over 9 billion in 2075. Four senarios were presented from the Chatham House working party. They are:

1. Just a Blip

2. Food inflation 10yrs

Oil price $65
Bio fuel production ¯
Food production
Food stocks
Food prices ¯
Economy growing

Oil price $90
Asians eat more meat
More bad weather
Food stocks ¯
Food prices
Economy stagflation

Into a new era 10+yr

4. Food in Crisis 5 yrs

Oil price $150
Climate change stark
More crop losses
Carbon pricing
Tough env. Controls
More local production
Food prices high then falling

Oil price $200
Extreme weather
New crop diseases
Water shortages
Food stocks exhausted
High food prices
Economy in recession

The UK has overcome food shortages in the past, for example in World War II. The FMEG should consider the role of automation, lean manufacturing, reduction of waste and efficient process control.
J A Spring 16 July 2008 ...

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