QUALITY AND QUANTITY
Prior to the Brillopak installation,
Worldwide Fruit used a roundtable
system before moving to a roller belt,
which was fitted at the end-of-line onto
a flow-wrap machine. Although the
product exits from the sealing system
efficiently, the packing operators
weren’t running to the same capacity.
The real issue, recalls Sam, was that
operators were in control of packing
speeds, not the line, which caused
productivity issues when it came to
flow.
“Packing operatives couldn’t keep up
with the pace and it became quite a
bottleneck. This led to a build-up of
product, more stoppages and potential
fruit quality issues,” notes Sam.
When searching for the ideal solution,
the team were quick to single out
Brillopak PakStation leads
to considerable savings and
increased OEE for Worldwide Fruit
Brillopak’s PakStation. Neal Collishaw,
Operations Director at Worldwide Fruit,
confirmed trials after observing the
equipment in action in 2017. Soon after,
the machine was attached to the flow-
wrapper at their Spalding site in January
2018.
are a key strategy in the implementation
and feeds product to staff at an ideal of industry 4.0. Yet, for many
height and orientation, enabling the businesses, semi-automated packing
team to load at a suitable pace. Because lines provide the benefits required to
of this, workforce health and injury risks reach optimum production, such as
as well as physical and mental stress quality assurance and ROI.
levels are reduced.
Rather than removing humans from
A further improvement was the the process, the PakStation helps
installation of an additional guard manual workers to do a better, more
sensor, making it safe if an operator efficient job. Although Brillopak is
needs to go into the machine for capable of providing robotic packers, the
maintenance. Brillopak has already
fitted the same safety device onto the
“Brillopak were very willing to listen to second PAKStation. “They’ve listened
our specific requirements. Quality of to recommendations we’ve made and
adapted to our needs” adds Sam.
International fruit marketing and The Brillopak machine relieves these fruit is important to us and making sure
distribution company Worldwide Fruit, issues and enables more throughput with that our product is not damaged during
supplier of quality fruit products to UK fewer line stoppages, increasing OEE on supermarkets, has boosted its capacity the packing line.
to load flow wrapped apples into crates
The packer is ergonomically designed
any of the processes. Overall, the semi-
FINDING THE RIGHT SOLUTION
automatic packer reduces the issues we
had and we saw more throughput on As production moves towards full
the line with less downtime,” says Sam. automation, it’s safe to say that robots
companies collaboratively decided the
semi-automated solution was ideal for
Worldwide Fruit’s requirements. “Some
companies might’ve gone ahead with
a robot, and it probably wouldn’t have
resolved our problem,” notes Sam.
Payback for the system has been
extremely quick when combining
while maintaining product integrity. The Because of this success, the distributor result is a more efficient end-of-line has recently put in another order for throughput and OEE. It is workforce
loading process and increases efficiency. a second machine for its Spalding friendly and more than capable of
packhouse to load a more varied range of matching the speeds of the flow-
fruit. Observing the productivity benefits wrapper system, prompting Sam to
and flexibility of the initial line. order another at Worldwide Fruit’s
The improvements are credited to the
installation of an ergonomically and where 65 million packs of fruit per year
innovatively designed Brillopak semi- are graded, processed and packaged,
automated PakStation for loading crates ready for distribution.
at Worldwide Fruit’s Spalding facility.
the reduction in line stops, increased
Spalding plant.
Speed, efficiency and eliminating damage,
plus the ability to increase capacity “They were very accommodating,”
Last year, the company replaced its crate within factory space limitations, were concludes Sam. “Worldwide Fruit and
Worldwide Fruit sources apples, pears, loading soft touch roller belt system for among the key catalysts for adopting Brillopak have worked incredibly well
avocados and stone fruit from the UK, a Brillopak semi-automated PakStation. Brillopak’s semi-automated PakStation. together, which is why we’ve gone back
New Zealand, South America, South The investment was to increase capacity Sam Roberts, Senior Production Manager for a second time.”
Africa, USA and Europe. Roughly, 380 but also strengthen the overall flow of explains: “The machines are compact and staff are employed across two facilities, the process by eliminating bottlenecks. easily fit into our factory layout.”
34 FDPP - www.fdpp.co.uk
www.brillopak.co.uk
FDPP - www.fdpp.co.uk 35