Bakery and snacks equipment provider APV Baker has improved and expanded its range of twin-screw machines for the production of extruded snacks. The SB range of solid-barrel twin-screw extruders has been upgraded, which means that a variety of sizes and shapes of both filled and unfilled extruded pillow snacks can now be manufactured.
Possible new snacks include expanded pillows with improved outline definition and pillows with patterns such as chevrons and curves are now possible, thanks to the innovative crimper design. APV Baker's modular die format allows snack shapes to be changed easily and cost-effectively by fitting product-specific inserts. There is potential to expand the variety of shapes even further.
In addition, two additional models have been added to the family of APV Baker extruders - the SB 80 and SB 100. These offer outputs of up to 850 and 1,400 kg per hour respectively on a wide range of products including expanded, pillow and 3-D snacks, multi-grain chips, breakfast cereals and crispbreads.
The SB 80 and 100 machines are equipped as standard with new swing-away dies to make life much easier for the operator, by offering much simpler and quicker access for cleaning and maintenance.
APV claims that the current range of twin-screw extruders combines process flexibility and rapid changeover between products, with control benefits to improve performance and profitability. Features can include automatic start and stop sequences to reduce time, energy and waste; recipe management; alarm handling; and monitoring and recording of key product and process parameters.