Karl Eismann, a dairy specialist and dairy industry engineer, is Director of Operations for DMK's Private Label business unit. He has held various positions with Nestlé, Kraft Foods/Mondelez and Hochwald. Most recently he was Managing Director of the Jermi Group, a Swabian dairy company.
Our transformer
That's the name of the new project being implemented at the Altentreptow, Edewecht and Georgsmarienhütte plants. Three new high-performance slicing lines are being installed, which will generate a very high proportion of added value in the packaging of cheese for food retailers.
The previous situation:
The block cheese produced in our cheese factories used to be processed in several laborious steps: First the 15 kg blocks of cheese were transported by hand, then the film was cut, next the block was placed on a conveyor belt, after which the block was cut into large pieces, and finally stacked into packs and sorted into cartons by three employees on a turntable. Between seven and eight people were, and still are, involved in each of these operations. With a growing shortage of young workers, this has become a major risk for DMK. Cheese is also an expensive product: One kilo is made from ten kilos of raw milk - and production generates waste because the cheese has to be straightened at the back and front for the end consumer and for packaging.
The solution:
The new slicer takes a fifteen-kilo block of cheese and scans it. Each block is measured using artificial intelligence. Whereas up to three grams were previously lost during cutting, the scanner optimises the loss to less than or equal to 0.2 grams. The increasingly difficult search for workers in this sector is also almost completely eliminated: In the past, blocks of raw cheese had to be placed on the conveyor belts by hand, but now a cobot takes the cheese from the pallet and places it on the belt. Small robots remove the foil and dispose of it. The intelligently measured and pre-proportioned blocks of cheese are then fed to the high-performance slicer, where a fast-rotating blade cuts around 1,600 slices of cheese per minute. The machine has a vibrating conveyor that accurately sorts the pre-sliced cheese into packaging. In the “final packaging” stage, the cheese is automatically placed in sales trays and then transferred to palletising. Not only does the new machine require less manpower, it is also much more hygienic. Only one main machine operator and one controller are needed on the line. The first three systems will be up and running by the end of the year.
Turning old into new and increasing production capacity by 25%
The capacity of the slicing line at DMK's Kaatsheuvel site in the Netherlands has been doubled thanks to a win-win situation.
The previous situation:
The cheese slice line at the Dutch plant in Kaatsheuvel used to run on two lanes. Due to insufficient capacity in the plant itself, part of the production was outsourced to an external service provider. In order to remain competitive and to avoid the increasing difficulties in recruiting temporary workers, the plant came up with the idea of doubling the output of the slice line with little effort.
The solution:
In contrast to the new high-performance lines in Germany, the plant in the Netherlands had considered what could be usefully reused from equipment that was being decommissioned at other sites and what could continue to be used from the old line. What had to be purchased? The slicer was replaced, along with cobots - collaborative robots - for loading the line with block cheese and palletising the sales trays. The conveyor belts were extended from two to four lanes, and the investment was rounded off by the use of a reconditioned packaging station from a German plant, a so-called thermoforming machine for cheese packaging. The result was an almost new plant that increased the site's capacity by 25% while reducing all fixed costs.
The Waldner
A new all-rounder replaces the old Erca system at the cream cheese dairy in Zeven. MILRAM “Frühlingsquark” can now be produced in larger quantities in a much more sustainable, cost-effective and resource-efficient manner.
The previous situation:
In the past, the pots for making “Frühlingsquark” were “thermoformed” from a film. Unfortunately, the film used was made from polystyrene, a non-recyclable plastic. After the cup was produced, a label was applied to it, which often caused problems in the system. As all varieties of Milram's spring quark family were produced on this line, there was a lot of unproductive changeover time.
The solution:
With the new Waldner, it is now possible to use pre-formed and banded cups made entirely of polypropylene. These are fully recyclable and also weigh less - which is good for the environment and for production costs. The whole system is fully automated. However, in order to drastically reduce unproductive changeover costs when changing over to a different type, the idea of a double dosing unit was born. Whereas previously the filler and the entire system had to be cleaned when the type was changed, the double filler now allows the type to be changed outside the machine while the current type is being produced. This saves an enormous amount of time, which can then be used productively for filling. Such a change used to take one to two hours. Now it only takes a few minutes.
