We are delighted to have been selected as the turnkey supplier of a cheese truckle handling system for one of the UK’s best known cheese producers.

The system will be designed to dip cylindrical cheeses into a wax reservoir, negating the need for time consuming and costly operator input.

The scope of  supply includes a Cartesian pick and place system capable of handling up to 4 cheese truckles at a given time (4 separate grippers mounted from one head). The Y axis will be Festo’s ELGA-80 axis and we will utilise Festo’s DFM-20 pneumatic Z Axis.

4 cheese truckles will index to a predetermined position/datum whereupon they will be picked by 4 separate HGPD sealed grippers with adaptive gripper fingers (mimicking a human hand). The wax reservoir will be positioned adjacent to the pick position and the system will dip the 4 truckles in the wax. The cycle time (picking 4 truckles, dipping in the wax and placing on the conveyor) is 10 seconds to allow the wax to harden sufficiently.

Once dipped, the Z axis will raise and the Y axis will index the truckles to a second section of conveyor and deposit them. This conveyor will be a 1800mm section of cooling conveyor with a”knife edge” arrangement to peel wax off the belt. The conveyor will index the dipped truckles forward into the second existing wax reservoir where they will be fully submerged and then indexed into the cooling room prior to palletisation.

This is the third automated solution that we will have provided this customer who have really embraced robotics and automation and the benefits that it brings.

To discuss your specific handling application please call our sales team on 01823 431838.