Screening for food production

What needs to be separated?

Define the ingredient, separation task and contact/cleaning requirements before choosing the equipment.

• Ingredient safety screening
• Powder and granule classification
• Suitable liquid screening

Conditions that affect the selection

Consider foreign-material size, target product fraction, contact materials, cleaning, product changeover and the actual handling conditions.

Plan the inspection point

Locate the proposed screen in the ingredient or packing process and identify what is being rejected. Flour, spices and dairy powders can require different changeover and contact-material reviews. Screen integrity, retained material and cleaning access are relevant discussion points, while microbiological compliance and product certification require their own evidence.

Choose by the process checkpoint

Coffee, tea and shellfish are different screening questions

For coffee, distinguish whole beans, ground coffee and fines. For tea, distinguish leaves, fibres and powder. Size screening may use a circular, tumbling or linear route depending on shape and the accepted fraction; the same aperture does not imply the same result for each feed.

• Shellfish sizing is not the same task as filtering a food liquid. The current catalogue does not establish a validated shellfish-grading configuration; discuss the actual product and handling requirement before considering supply.
• A food-plant contaminant-removal request must identify the contaminant and separation principle. A screen does not replace metal detection, microbiological control or all inspection stages.