Tub Collator

Challenge

Froneri, a global powerhouse in ice cream, and the owner of New Zealand’s beloved Tip Top brand, approached us as they implemented their worldwide ‘bigger, better, faster’ strategy. The challenge was simple: ‘speed things up and save us time and money without compromising the product’.  

The customer’s existing machines in their Mount Wellington, Auckland factory could not be adapted to manage the increased workload and we worked with the Head of Operations and Plant Manager Martin Utschig to devise a brand-new conveying solution.  

A vital factor was the need to ‘lock’ the tapered tubs of ice cream together into a robust stack (three high by three wide) ready for shrink wrapping and palletizing. 

Solution

Because of the enormous volumes at play (currently 4,000,000 tubs and counting) we created the all-important rotation helix section as a real-life ‘proof of concept’ trial.  

One in three ice cream tubs must be rotated through a gravity propelled twist chute to obtain the all-important ‘lock’ when 3 are stacked. Once we had this section running perfectly to the customer’s satisfaction we pressed ahead and produced a unique three lane conveyor which separates a single stream of tubs into three evenly distributed lanes. As always, we needed all the machinery to be gentle on the tubs, low maintenance and reliable.  

Dynamic laning removes any stop/start issues with shock-loading meaning that the lids never pop off during the process.  

Food hygiene is obviously paramount and the whole system is designed to be fully washable. 

Once the middle lane has been rotated, the tubs are collated, and a servo-controlled stacker is used to stack the rows three high. The next module of the RML system performs the shrink-wrapping and these are then ready for the pallets.  

Installed in late 2020, the wrapper and conveyor is showing no signs of wear and tear and we are looking forward to a long and fruitful business relationship.