When one of the UK’s largest growers and producers of fresh vegetables, the Produce World Group, decided to invest in a new grading line to improve the efficiency of its grading operations, it chose a grading line designed by Tong Engineering. With Produce World’s specific requirements in mind, design engineers at Tong Engineering developed a grading system that allowed Produce World to achieve each and every grade size within a single grading line.
“With such a wide range of grading requirements, the obvious solution would be two grading lines, or at least a number of interchanging grading screen modules” explained Nick Woodcock, Sales Manager at Tong Engineering. “However, we wanted to look at Produce World’s brief very specifically, to achieve one grading line that not only required much less space within the Sutton Bridge grading facility, but also kept grading screen changes to an absolute minimum. The grading line allows Produce World to increase throughput whilst minimising damage and reducing downtime at all times, particularly during the peak season.”
Featuring two Tong heavy duty 160 degree box tippers at the in-feed followed by Tong’s EasyClean separator feeding onto an inspection area, the grading line consists of a total of fifteen Tong EasyGrade screen sizing modules feeding graded crop into four Tong EasyFill twin box fillers and three single box fillers, offering accurate grading with throughputs of up to 30 tonnes per hour.
“The grading line incorporates all of Tong’s latest control features, from a multi-user Auto-Touch HMI touch screen allowing suitable access and control to all users at all levels and illuminated box filling beacons making it quicker and easier for forklift drivers to see which boxes need changing next. The line also features fully automated grading screen speed and agitation adjustment and an energy efficient power-saving mode that shuts-off equipment that is not in use”, says Nick.
Katie Stark, Operations Director at Produce World Sutton Bridge commented “We are dedicated to using innovative processes to provide solutions that meet the needs of our customers. When we set the brief for our new grading facility we were very specific about our requirements and Tong really looked at the brief and put a lot of thought and effort into what we needed.”
