se of last year Krones introduced a new range of fillers for the food industry, with the first of the new equipment being successfully installed at the world renowned Austrian jam maker, Darbo, who purchased the Krones Viscofill filler for their range of miniature jams and marmalades.The Viscofill is a piston filler, developed specifically for viscous, thread-forming foods and those containing chunks. It is a classical piston filler that incorporates many of the design features that Krones have developed for their beverage fillers, making the Viscofill the outstanding filler for the food industry.
The Viscofill effortlessly masters the tricky challenge of filling even hard to handle products like jam containing large chunks or whole fruit, without damaging the delicate product. Viscofill fills the jars without dripping or leaving behind any unattractive or unhygienic splashes on the neck of the jar.
In the design of the Viscofill, Krones designers paid special attention to hygiene. The filler’s food and drive areas are hermetically sealed and separated from each other eliminating the risk of an ingress of product into the mechanical parts of the filler. The cleaning function of the Viscofill is completely automated, requiring no manual intervention. When the Viscofill needs to be cleaned, either at the end of a shift or product changeover, the filler turret’s components automatically move away from each other, so all product contact parts are fully exposed for cleaning.
The transparent machine guards allow the machine operator to watch the whole process. The Viscofill has a tilting stainless steel trough that collects any flushed off product residues and cleaning media, which is then removed from the filler via a central drain, thus keeping the production room floor spotlessly clean.
The Viscofill has been designed to handle jar sizes from miniatures up to litre for both glass and PET, with a speed range of 11,000 to 64,000 c.p.h. depending on the number of dosing units. The smallest filler is fitted with10 dosing heads and can accommodate up to a maximum of 60. Krones also offer a number of capping choices together with tamper evident options whether the requirement is for a TE seal or paper TE seal.
Andrew Wilson, managing director of Krones UK commented, “The Viscofill is a great addition to our range and now allows us the opportunity to sell complete lines to the food sector, whether that is for jams, preserves, honey, cooking sauces or coffee. We have all of the other elements required from depalletisers through to rinser, filler capper, labelling, cartoning and palletising machinery. Krones can also supply a complete range of inspectors, checkweighers and metal detectors with the ancillary conveyors, so we are in a position to offer the complete line.
An example of the Viscofill will be on the Krones stand at Interpack in May.”
