Hygienic and easy to clean cable protection, essential in the Food & Pharma Industry

Jerry Matena, Area Sales Manager Benelux for Anamet Europe shares how Anamet was able to design a successful solution for a client in the food industry ‘by having a full understanding of the design, equipment and application’.

Understanding the problem

A client in the food industry has developed a machine, which is used for the slicing of fish. The application is dynamic, and therefore there is a lot of movement. ‘Because the cable bundle in the application would easily get contaminated in a short period of time, we had to look at a solution to prevent this quick contamination’ Jerry says.

All machinery and equipment in the food industry that gets contaminated will require rapid and proper cleaning on a frequent basis. In order to do this the machine needs to be shut off; this is causing ‘down time’. Down time is something that needs to be minimized for any process or machine, to ensure the highest revenue from the machine. However, in the food industry hygiene is of the utmost importance, down time is thus depending on the fouling rate of the machine and/or its processes. Cable trays / cable bundles are highly sensitive to contamination. When this contamination is not properly managed this could result in contagion throughout the entire process.

Getting the full picture

Nowadays most manufacturers develop, design and produce machinery in a very hygienic manner, which means the machines can easily and/or quickly be cleaned.

Jerry adds ‘However, what they usually forget or do not even consider, is that all parts of the machine, like engines, pumps and hardware components need power or data to function, which requires the use of cables. These cables, often bundled together, are difficult to clean’.

For manufacturers in the food industry that design and produce machinery is it very important their cables are cleared away, which can be achieved by incorporating them in a flexible conduit system, which, next to the conduit itself, also includes hygienic fittings.

Helping the client

We were able to help this specific client by looking at the design of his machine and provide advice on how to incorporate his cable trays in a hygienic way. To create a successful solution, it was necessary to have a good understanding of the design, machine and application. We decided to use our hygienic Food grade conduit and the hygienic Food grade fitting.

Now our client has a machine where several cables are hygienically incorporated into one conduit system. The conduit is very fast and easy to clean, which not only keeps downtime to a minimum but even decreased the cleaning interval. In this way the machine runs more hours per day than a machine that does not have a well-considered hygienic design, and has a lower risk of contamination. ‘All of this ensures that the machine, our client is selling, is more attractive to the end user, buying the machines. Which helps our client sell his machines.’

Do you have a question about what Anamet Europe can do for you? Contact our customer service directly by phone: +31-20-5863586 or by email: sales@anamet.nl.