Conveying peanuts

LEE Swinson, founder of Golden Grove, needed to speed up the filling process of 1 tonne bags of peanuts in order to meet growing demand from his customers. His operators were able to manually fill 20 bags a day at the most. They operated three hoppers with a weighing scale and a slide gate at the bottom of the hopper allowing the peanuts to flow into a bag underneath. The process was very labor-intensive and did not provide a consistent weight – needing staff to continually fill the hopper and operate the slide gate.

Spiroflow, a manufacturer of conveying and weighing systems, recommended an automated gain-in-weight filling system with C1-2 Bulk Bag Fillers.  Each of Golden Grove’s three filling stations are set up with a large elevator conveyor that continually delivers raw in-shell peanuts to the hopper. The bottom of each hopper is fitted with an automatic slide valve.  Crucially this means the bags are filled without any risk of dust contamination and, thanks to the automated weighing on the control panel, the bags are filled to an exact weight, rather than giving or leaving a kilogram as before. The new bulk bag filler works on a pallet platform – so the heavy bags can be moved via forklift truck

Down to one operator

Golden Grove now requires just one operator at the bulk bag filling station, and 300 bags are filled per day, ready to ship to wholesalers around the world, an increase of fifteen times.  Weighing accuracy has also been improved by more than 400%; the risk of contamination is now negligible and peanuts are no longer wasted.

Mr Swinson says he’s so pleased with the results, his new equipment is more than worth the investment: “A Spiroflow Systems controls engineer worked onsite to program the control panels, which was worth paying for. The bulk bag fillers are simple and durable. The Spiroflow solution delivered the exceptional filling speed we needed.”

Michel Podevyn, President at Spiroflow, added: “Many millions of bulk bags, with a capacity from 500kg to 2000kg, are sold worldwide every year, making them one of the most convenient, cost-effective methods of packaging, storage and transport. Customers in industries ranging from food and pharmaceuticals to plastics and building products use bulk bags, and hence require the best equipment to fill and discharge their often fragile or fine-particle products quickly and with the minimum of fuss.

“At Spiroflow our technical team is constantly innovating, developing new solutions and adaptations in our test centre to meet customer demand for the next improvement or upgrade. Our C Series of weigh fillers remain extremely popular as they’re both efficient and versatile, and we’re confident that the new C1 will prove an equally successful addition to our range.”