FOOD BLENDING CASE STUDIES

FOOD BLENDING WHITE PAPERS & ARTICLES

  • Best Practices For Conducting Virtual FAT’s In Food Manufacturing

    When the COVID-19 pandemic hit, it became critical that manufacturing plants remain open and operating to provide essential items such as food, beverage, sanitation supplies and more to consumers. New practices were put into place to ensure the safety of all and maintain efficient, effective operations. A critical aspect of keeping up with consumer demand has been the testing and acceptance of new equipment. With consumer packaged goods (CPG) companies reluctant to bring suppliers into their facilities and service technicians limited in their ability to travel due to COVID-19 protocol, the industry has had to get creative to complete the process.

  • 10 Things You Should Know When Considering A Tumble Blender

    Whether you're considering a tumble blender for your process or shopping for a suitable piece of blending equipment, here are 10 things you should think about before the making final decision.

  • 5 Steps To Increase Energy-Efficient Mixing

    Mixer testing simulation trials are needed to confirm the suitability of a specific mixing strategy. This white paper explores five ways to increase energy efficiency in new and existing mixing processes.

  • Solutions To Batch Mixing Issues

    Mixing processes vary from one application to another and there are no fix-all solutions.This white paper presents some strategies for improving commonly encountered batch mixing problems.

  • Efficiencies In Powder Dispersion For Manufacturers

    Uniformly dispersing powders into a liquid batch in a practical amount of time is a common problem for F&B manufacturers. This white paper explores five tips for dispersing powders more efficiently.

  • How To Optimize Solid-Liquid Mixing

    This paper provides practical information on the efficient use of specialty mixing equipment for the preparation of low, medium and high viscosity solid-liquid mixtures under low and high shear conditions.

FOOD BLENDING PRODUCTS

The latest development in high shear lab mixing – the new Silverson L5M-A – is ideal for all laboratory work, research and development, QA analysis and small scale production in all industries.

Silverson’s sanitary series of high shear Bottom Entry mixers are designed to fit into the bottom or side of a mixing vessel. These high shear mixers are typically used in conjunction with a slow speed anchor stirrer or scraper unit for high viscosity products.

Scott Turbon® Laboratory, Top Mounted, and Hydraulic Ram Mixers can be fitted with additional mixing technology for more efficient processing of thick products. 

The Hydraulic Ram (HR) Mixers are designed and built for full scale production. Its adjustable mixer height allows for a variety of batch sizes and viscosities.

This series of mixers are designed for small scale production in pilot plants. Light and easily operated, AX series models have a capacity of up to 50 liters.

Silverson High Shear In-Line mixers are supremely efficient and rapid in operation and are capable of reducing mixing times by up to 90%. The action of any Silverson In-Line mixer can be modified with the use of rapidly interchangeable workheads. This enables any machine to mix, emulsify, homogenize, solubilize, suspend, disperse and disintegrate solids.

Double Cone Blenders are most often used for the intimate dry blending of free flowing solids. The solids being blended in these units can vary in bulk density and in percentage of the total mixture. Materials being blended are constantly being intermixed as the Double Cone rotates. Normal cycle times are typically in the range of 10 minutes, however they can be less depending on the difficulty of blending.

ABOUT FOOD BLENDING

Industrial food blending usually refers to the process of mixing two distinct solids or mixing of bulk solids with small ratios of liquids. Blending and mixing are interchangeable terms. However, blending is generally more gentle than mixing, which is why it’s technically different. The outcome of blending is to take two or more pure elements and combine them into a new product where samples of it will contain the same ratio of the elements that were combined to be blended.   

Examples of products created from mixing solids in food manufacturing include: cake mixes, coffee, tea, beverage powders, ice-cream mixes, yogurts, spices, flours, trail mixes, and cereals.

Examples of or products created from mixing solids with liquids in food manufacturing include: confectionary, pasta, ready-to-eat cereals, pet foods, and dairy products.

Blending equipment is offered in various styles. The style that your food-making operation needs will be based on many different factors, such as, but not limited to: what products are being blended, efficiency, batch size, the facility’s available manufacturing space, preciseness of the blend, energy costs, discharging options, cleaning, and sanitation options.

The most-common styles of blending equipment are:

  • Ribbon Benders — are the most-popular blenders. They use helical ribbons, accommodate larger batch sizes, are very versatile, and cost efficient.
  • Vertical Blenders — are cone shaped and designed for vacuum operations. These blenders are easy to clean, are gentler than horizontal blenders, and have virtually 100 percent discharge.
  • Tumble Blenders — are double-cone shaped and rotate on a horizontal axis. These blenders are generally used for precise blends and thorough blending of powders.
  • Paddle Blenders — These blenders use multiple paddles as agitators and accommodate larger batch sizes. They also have very low shear and generate very minimal heat.

After choosing the style of industrial food blender that will suit your company’s food-processing requirements, it will be equally important to make sure the ribbons, paddles, rods, and shafts are matched to the physical properties of the elements being blended. This is imperative to ensuring better efficiency and reducing maintenance downtime.