Quality analysis for quality food Atline/ Online/ Inline solutions for quality and process control of grain, flour and meat

In the last years the requirements of the customers and the government increased to offer and to safe a higher quality in all foodstuffs. With the aid of the near-infrared spectroscopy could enable a contact-free quality control within seconds. Thus the quality can be monitored and controlled from the incoming goods till the final products. But also the essential steps during the production can be optimized with the aid of the NIR technology. Because only if you exactly know what and how you manufacture can you interfere in the process in real-time and you can adjust the process to the actual conditions. On this account you can be reduced the failure and the waste due to the use of NIR technology. Therefore time, energy as well as money and in the first instance you can save your good reputation.

Carl Zeiss offers for the whole agriculture and food business value chain NIR systems which are optimized for the demands of the special applications. Thus the product portfolio includes solution for the use on harvester, for the intake control, for the process control and optimization such as in the laboratory for routine analysis.

Therefore Carl Zeiss provides very robust and easy to use devices with NIR technology for the use at the harvesting on the field. These systems are designed for the use under harsh environmental conditions and provide information about the moisture and the protein value of grain, corn, wheat, barley, forage and so on during the harvesting in real-time. This information can be used for the preparation of the soil with fertilizer to get also a good harvest in the next year. Moreover the quality of the harvest is known during the harvesting and it can be made decision of the usage and the price for the sale to the cooperatives.

A further application is the quality control of the incoming grain, barley, corn, wheat, flour and so on in silo installation or mills. There are two possibilities to do an inspection. First we offer a process spectrometer which is based on diode array technology. The CORONA PLUS is optimal for the measurement of the ingredients and color of bulk materials in pipes or chain conveyers.  The compact, light and robust spectrometer can be installed in each production line very easily. The new optical design enables very short measurement times and provides constant monitoring, for example, of the flour milling process and provides real time results to the control system so that adjustments to the process can be made immediately. The CORONA PLUS is used in the flour milling industry for the analysis of the milling process to manage flour quality for moisture, protein and ash concentrations. The process specifications on these parameters are rigid to maximize product yield.

For the subsample testing of the incoming goods we offer the CORONA PLUS in combination with a TURNSTEP, which can also use for the analysis in a laboratory environment. This combination permits large quantities of samples to be measured in the laboratory within a short period of time, leading to a reduction of sampling errors. This means that quality-critical parameters of the constituents used for beverages and other foodstuffs can be measured with higher accuracy - an essential requirement for ensuring constant quality of the end product. Other advantage is that for the process control and the sub-sample testing the same device can be used. This possibility enables even comparable results and it can be used the same calibration in the laboratory as well as in the process control, monitoring and optimization. This combination is designed for the reduction of measuring errors in the case of inhomogeneous sample material.

For the quality monitoring during the production of food Carl Zeiss offers further solutions. For example the MCS 600 spectrometer with the distance measurement probe ARMOR which is designed for the contact-free in-line measurement of ingredients (protein, fat, water, ...) of different products on a belt conveyer or in a cutter.  A special feature of the ARMOR measurement probe is the automatic reference system which permits precise measurements even if there are large distances between the measuring probe and the sample material. This allows measurements to be performed in areas where an even mound height of the sample material cannot ensure. A really good application for the MCS 600 with the ARMOR measurement probe is the meat industry. This has also seen an increased concentration of production capacities accompanied by every increasing production output. These processes go hand in hand with the new demands being placed on production quality and the requirement for 100% traceability of all raw materials and other ingredients. To achieve these requirements measurements and analytical methods are needed which guarantee uninterrupted product analysis in the manufacturing process. The results obtain must be immediately available as the control parameters for process optimization. The aim is to achieve consistent product quality while ensuring the whole manufacturing process in fully documented. The MCS 600 with the ARMOR measurement probe is the optimal solution for these demands. The extremely fast measurement times in the millisecond range provide continuous monitoring of the fast product flows. And also the mechanical properties and the protection level allowed the usage in the meat industry. Parameters like fat, protein, water, lean meat protein content (Beffe) as well as the ph-value can be measured to indicate the quality of the ingredients. The user friendly software enables the integration into existing production control systems and optimization interfaces.

All in one you can find by Carl Zeiss atline, online and inline spectrometer for the control and the optimization of your harvesting or production process in the agriculture and food industry.