Giuseppe Allais, industry segment manager, Food Sales Development Team, Ammeraal Beltech, said in semi-automatic food processing lines, belts are often marked with circles or squares, to indicate the correct positioning of products for processing.
Worst case scenario
The markings are printed on the top of a belt with ink and are subject to spills from food, scrapers and cleaning agents.
“The worst case scenario for a food manufacturer is a customer finding an ink mark on their food,” said Allais.
“The risks are clear. What would happen if you heated up a frozen tortilla but you found blue marks on the product? It would lead to an expensive and lengthy food recall operation not to mention the damage it would do to brand reputation.”
He added the Permaline U2 positioning belts have clear, non-fading sealed markings where any design can be printed, including full-colour photographs and the print is sealed below an easy-to-clean protection layer.
“The belt layout is top-coated with a transparent, wear-resistant food-grade layer that protects the food from the print,” said Allais.
“Permaline’s enclosed printed surface is a move away from the traditional marking techniques used on conveyor systems such as hand-made drawings, metal inserts, and laser print, and an improvement in terms of flexibility, durability and hygiene.”
According to Allais, semi-automated bakery and confectionery topping and filling lines depend on accurate visual positioning of the product on a conveyor and the machine is designed with this aspect of food processing and packaging in mind.
FDA approval
It comes with EU and FDA food contact approvals.
“In a market where the size and shape of the goods carried on the conveyor is rarely the same twice, the pre-printed positioning template on the belt’s surface is produced to the customer’s specification,” added Allais.
One of its customers is pizza manufacturer, Svila, which has installed the Permaline U2 belt at its factory in Italy.
“We launched the belt in December last year and we have already installed the machine at a Svila pizza manufacturer,” added Allais.
“We wanted to improve the machine’s performance and with the top-coated, transparent, belt with a wear-resistant food-grade layer we believe its smart technology for avoiding ink contamination as well the wearing effect of belt scrapers.
“Food Safety needs are continuously growing in the bakery food processing sector and the next project for us is an extension of our run proof, non-fray fabric belts.”