Sausage and ground meat inspection solutions enhance food safety while maximizing food production
The answer to the age-old question, “what is sausage made of,” can be tricky. Wipotec sausage and ground meat inspection solutions help ensure that the food products shipped out the door do not contain anything that should not be in the sausage or ground meat package. Using X-ray scanners and checkweighers during food manufacturing and packaging enhances food safety while maximizing food production throughput.
As of January 2019, 50% of the six latest FDA mandated sausage recalls involved either metal or rubber foreign body contamination. These FDA enforcement actions required the recall of over 42,411 lbs. / 19,237 kg. sausage1. While modest in comparison to other recalls, these foreign body contamination recalls present a strain on the associated company’s financial resources, consumer trust, and brand integrity.
1Source: www.fsis.usda.gov/wps/portal/fsis/topics/recalls-and-public-health-alerts/current-recalls-and-alerts
E-paper: Maximum safety in meat and sausage production
In meat and sausage production, consumer safety is a top priority. Foreign bodies of all kinds can be detected to prevent any possible harm to customers.
In our e-paper you learn more about different inspection possibilities and the optimal use of product inspection solutions in your production line – for 100 % safety and quality guarantee of your meat products.
Advanced product inspection technology maximizes sausage and ground meat food safety and ensures brand integrity and consumer value
Forward thinking sausage and ground meat processors use advanced product inspection technology in the form of checkweighers and X-ray scanners during food production and packaging to ensure correct fill weights, and that the food is free of foreign body contaminates.
The U.S., the EU, and many individual countries have regulations in place that mandates all food be “safe to eat, produced under sanitary conditions, contain no harmful substances and be truthfully labeled.”
These regulatory mandates are backed up by enforcement actions that can be devastating to the financial well-being of a sausage and ground meat processor.
Wipotec provides checkweighing and X-ray scanning machines used in the inspection of meat and sausage. Companies around the world have come to rely of our checkweighers and X-ray scanners as proven product inspection methods that enhance their customer’s trust while protecting the company brand.
Our x-ray scanners used in sausage and ground meat inspection maximizes brand integrity
- Maximizing product safety is really all about protecting your brand. Delivering top quality sausage and ground meat products to consumers’ increases customer satisfaction and builds brand loyalty.
- One use of X-ray product inspection systems is to prevent sausage and ground meat shipments containing foreign bodies from reaching the market. Foreign body detection (FBD) includes setting the X-ray scanner up to find bits of metal, plastic, stones, and other foreign bodies in the sausage and ground meat packages.
For bulk packaging, X-ray product inspection is used after the sausage and ground meat fillers to:
- Ensure proper package fill-levels and completeness checks
- Clip forming – making sure that the clips are installed properly
- Clip counting – making sure all the clips are present
- Clip blanking – is a software tool that “removes” the clip from the inspection field for the foreign body detection tasks used on the bulk packages in order to prevent false rejects
- The type of Wipotec X-ray scanner used in sausage and ground meat processing depends on several application parameters.
- Pre-package filler – Usually the SC-B X-ray scanner is used here for foreign body detection of the bulk sausage and ground meat
- Post-package and bulk filler - A number of different options are available here including the SC-E and SC line of X-ray scanners. The choice largely depends on the unique application parameters related to package type, package quantities within the field of view, production line speed, product orientation, and the required product inspection tasks. An SC-V is also an option for those applications requiring both an X-ray scanning set of tasks as well as needing to perform visual checks on the final sausage and ground meat package label.
“For many years, our poultry farm has relied on the high-precision weighing technology of Wipotec, the innovative technology concept and the outstanding service.
The checkweighers are very easy to operate and provide 100% product checks with reliable ejection systems. These machines are extremely well-suited for use in wash-down environments thanks to the stainless steel design and their incredible accuracy.”
Claus Foldager, Head of Technology at HKScan, Vinderup, Denmark
Our X-ray scanners ensures high quality products
The advantages of our X-ray scanners
- Modular machine design
- Enables easy integration into existing production lines and faster start-ups
- Wide range of product options and machine configurations
- High-resolution camera detector technology enhances FBD capabilities
- An extensive array of built-in software tools support a wide variety of product inspection tasks
Combinations of X-ray, and checkweighers
- Combo units that pair an X-ray scanner with a checkweigher are also available for sausage and ground meat product inspection called the SC-W for those product inspection applications where floor space is at a premium
Our checkweighers used in sausage and ground meat inspection enhance consumer value
The advantages of our checkweighers
- The core Wipotec EMFR weigh cell technology enables the fast and accurate capture of sausage and ground meat product weight
- Machine modularity is designed in to support a wide range of product inspection requirements
- User-friendly HMI simplifies machine start up and operation
- Precise sausage and ground meat product filling results saves money while enhancing consumer value
- IP69k hygienic wash down checkweigher versions available
Reliable Marking of Sausage and Meat Products
The best-before date must always be indicated on the packaging of a product. Highly perishable goods such as fresh minced meat may not be sold without a specific expiry date. This primarily serves to protect consumers, but also safeguards the brand image and thus the economic interests of manufacturers.
So the print needs to be appropriately legible and of high quality to ensure that customers can read the information. Adding a code to this text opens up completely new possibilities - while also increasing the demands on print quality. Correctly applied batch coding can optimize internal processes and significantly improve the later allocation of goods, which makes recalls much easier. Producers are therefore increasingly recognizing the advantages of dynamic 2D codes that are printed on the production line. The manufacturer can integrate the best-before date, batch, production time, origin and much more information into the code and thus make it available to the supply chain right through to the end consumer.
For all these tasks, your organization now needs an integrated solution that puts the quality of the marking first. The systems from Wipotec meet the highest demands:
Weber Food Technology
“What you are performing here really is the perfect final inspection.”
— Stefan Krakow, Director Product Management
Simplify labeling with TQS
One of the major advantages of the modularity of our TQS solutions is that the composition of a system always depends on the application. In addition to labeling and weighing, this can include a metal detector or even several labeling units. As in this slicer line from Weber Food Technology. All modules are always integrated in one control unit. This increases efficiency enormously.
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Block House Butchery
“We must ensure 100% that the goods we bring to market are fully and correctly marked.”
— Jörg Jablonski, Managing Director
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How the Block House butchery ensures the highest quality
At Block House, everything comes together - the Hamburg butcher's company relies on checkweighers, metal detectors, X-ray devices and coding units from Wipotec. Almost 15 years ago, the foundations were laid for a strong partnership, from which not least the customers have always benefited. Steaks, burgers and entire grill boxes are extensively tested during production so that only high-quality products end up in the supermarket shelves. As a result, Block House has truly earned its reputation as a premium brand.
Read the detailed application report to find out how our systems help to automate production, which hygiene concepts are advisable and where the biggest challenges lie during implementation: