Cheese Market News Highlights the Hayssen ISB at Pack Expo International
Nov 03, 2022
At the 2022 Pack Expo tradeshow in Chicago, BW Packaging experts showcased some of the company’s newest innovations for cheese packaging, including its Hayssen ISB vertical form-fill-seal (VFFS) bagger
According to Dan Minor, global product line leader for VFFS solutions at BW Flexible Systems — a division of BW Packaging — the Hayssen ISB offers the highest levels of sanitary design and construction available in the market today.
“With an overall rating of IP66, the machine is designed to withstand direct high-pressure washdown and the aggressive sanitizing agents required to ensure food safety,” Minor notes. “With extensive use of precision servo controls, the Hayssen ISB offers film and product feeding features uniquely suited to handle the ever-changing range of sustainable packaging films.”
The Hayssen ISB is ideally suited for packaging fresh or chilled shredded, grated or cubed cheeses into foodservice and retail packs. It takes hygienic design, cleanability, performance and ease of use to a new level for cheese packaging, Minor adds.
The machine design was based on the most recent industry standards for dairy, meat, produce and RTE (ready to eat) applications, notes Margaret Valinski, director of VFFS sales, North America, for BW Packaging.
“Minimizing harborage points for contamination and accessibility for cleaning was a priority,” Valinski says.
“Throughout the machine, stand-offs are utilized when attaching components, and the entire frame is stainless steel open channel design with sloped surfaces for self-draining.”
She notes special attention was given to the wiring and cabling. Traditionally, wiring is bundled together with wire ties; however, this approach makes it impossible to thoroughly clean and decontaminate the machine.
“On the Hayssen ISB, all the cabling and tubing is separated and retained in purpose-made brackets. This approach allows for complete washdown,” Valinski says.
“Apart from food safety, a top challenge that our customers voiced was high employee turnover,” she adds. “It was essential that the Hayssen ISB be easy to operate, maintain, clean and change over. Using customer anthropology observations and in-depth customer interviews, we designed the machine and its operating procedures in a user-centered way to ensure that the user actions and experience are as simple, efficient and error-proof as possible.”
For example, on machine changeover, BW Packaging optimized the sequence and location of changeover adjustments such that an operator can systematically and quickly perform the work with the fewest number of steps around the machine, Valinski says.
“Another example relates to the most important factor of all — safety,” she adds. “Through our research, we observed operators and maintenance personnel putting themselves at risk when changing over the forming tube. This assembly can be quite heavy and ergonomically awkward to change out. With the Hayssen ISB, we placed the forming tube on a swing-out arm, allowing safer and easier access.”
Learning a new machine or process always comes with challenges, Minor notes.
“For the operator, we have designed the user interface with graphical troubleshooting indicators and on-screen instructions for recovery. To prevent untrained or unauthorized personnel from making changes to machine recipes and settings, we have incorporated RFID pass card access — in most cases any standard employee ID badge can be used to provide customized access credentials unique to that person,” he says. “The system records any parameter changes as well as who made the change and when the change occurred. In the event a parameter has been changed from the stored recipe setting, a small flag appears next to that setting so that supervisors can immediately see if a change has been made.”
He adds one of the most popular features is status illumination. Based on the operating state, the entire machine illuminates different colors, such as:
• Running-green;
• Stopped-red;
• Warning-yellow; and
• Waiting-blue.
“This feature allows operators and supervisors to observe the machine condition from across the room rather than relying on stack lights that are often blocked by other equipment,” Minor says.
To learn about other cheese packaging innovations that were featured in the Cheese Market News Packaging Progress profile, visit the BW Packaging blog.