Hygiene-design grippers

Jens Schröder: It is an essential factor for future production. Due to a lack of workers, high cost pressure and rising wages at the same time, I believe that automating processes is the only way to sustainably produce food in high quantity and quality and thereby ensure that Germany remains competitive.

The machines and systems have to meet high standards of hygiene, of course. Only well planned and designed systems can offer advantages in this area compared to manual production. Particularly if companies are subject to a high seasonal or general lack of skilled workers, automated systems can guarantee consistent quality standards and prevent hygiene risks.

The robot manufacturers' further developments are leading to an increasing number of models that can be used directly with food. However, the robots can only be used to automate processes with the appropriate gripping tool. Handling food involves a variety of obstacles that often turn the gripping process into an extremely complex undertaking.

Hygiene and cleaning become very important when direct contact with the product is involved. Gripping systems have to be easy to clean and must not pose a risk of contamination for the products. In addition, the dimensions and weights often vary extensively when processing natural products. Products can be very fragile and sensitive and/or have rough, moist or sticky surfaces. A gripping system has to be adapted to all of these conditions and, at the same time, constantly has to function stably under changing temperature conditions and high cycle times.

In vacuum gripping technology, a vacuum is generated. In combination with a suction cup, this in turn produces a holding force for handling products. In contrast to other systems, no mechanical components are usually required, and the system can be quickly and easily adapted to the characteristics of the products by adapting the suction cups.

The principle used by our vacuum generator is based on the Coandă effect. Compressed air is routed through a ring gap onto a curved surface and guided along a nozzle in a defined way. This leads to the formation of a vacuum at the bottom of the nozzle, whereby ambient air is simultaneously drawn in thanks to the design of the nozzle, thereby resulting in air amplification.

Our system offers a variety of advantages for handling food. For instance, the vacuum can be generated directly above the product, resulting in a short contamination path. Hoses are not contaminated, and the system can be cleaned quickly and easily thanks to its hygienic design. In addition, the high air flow enables high leakages to be overcome, which is why even products that are not sealed air-tight can be gripped reliably and securely. This means that not even rough surfaces pose a problem.

Breaded products or porous and air-permeable products such as slices of bread, for example. Essentially, the system can be quickly and easily adapted to almost all products, meaning that meat, sausage products, cheese, fruit, vegetables and confectionery can all be handled with the gripping system.

The vacuum generator is made of stainless steel and has a hygienic design, meaning that quick and easy cleaning is guaranteed and cleaning agents don't pose a problem. Of course, the system has to be cleaned regularly. Depending on the product and process, this can be carried out quickly and easily directly in the system or in a dishwasher, for instance. The necessary suction cups are always selected so that ease of cleaning and food production conformity are also ensured in addition to their function.

The grippers are being used in diverse applications such as in packaging meat products, applying burger patties and handling cheese wheels or even biscuits. One very interesting example is their use in the avocado peeling process. For this, Kronen has used a DIL gripping solution to develop an innovative system that enables up to 1,000 fruits per hour to be processed with three robots. This opens up completely new opportunities in avocado processing.

We regard image processing in combination with artificial intelligence mechanisms to be an enormous driver of innovation for automation in the food industry. Products have to be assessed, qualities evaluated and gripping points determined.

Classic image processing often encounters its limits in the food environment, which means that AI can act as a problem solver here. Besides image processing, AI can also be used for data analysis in the areas of process control and production planning in order to establish more sustainable processes and use resources more efficiently.

The topics of image processing and AI have also increasingly shifted into focus at the DIL in recent years. The Movi-Q project, for instance, is focused on AI-aided visual quality controls for food and specifically on reducing barriers to entry in order to ensure that the technologies become more widely used. However, the acoustic evaluation of products, the visual recognition of animal behaviour or the digitalisation of the food value chain in general are also being incorporated into our research activities. These DIL research areas match the digitalisation activities of the Lower Saxony Food Sector Initiative (LI Food), which supports and advises companies in the food industry.