Sinclair Animal & Household Care Automates its Fish Food Line

Task: To design & build a fully automated weighing, filling and closing machine capable of packaging fish food into various sizes of pot.

Solution: The RFS 10-2 – a fully automated 10 station twin-pocket rotary star wheel type machine capable of filling 5 different pot sizes at a maximum of 60 pots/min dependant upon pot size/type.

Benefits:  Fully automated process – increased productivity – less product waste -  savings in labour costs – interchangeable pot sizes & weights

Sinclair Animal & Household Care (SAHC) chose CWM Automation Ltd to design and build a bespoke weighing, filling & packaging fish flake machine for its Gainsborough site.  The new 10 station twin-pocket rotary machine is designed and built to SAHC’s specific requirements and is based on integrated “stations”.  The product infeed station consists of a vibratory hopper with a bucket elevator on a gantry with steps which feeds into the weigh station.  A variable speed rotary table feeds onto a conveyor to transport the pots down to the filling and sealing machine.

The machine includes technological innovations to control the weight of this extremely light & variable product incorporating the latest hi-tech multi-head weigher.  To take account of the varying pot heights a servo adjustable loading platform was used to assist the transfer of pots into and out of the filling & closing stations.