At the end of last year, we worked on a project with our Buckinghamshire client to improve product turnover in their poultry feed mill. By upgrading their cooler to a double deck cooler, we were able to increase the volume of product throughput and improve batch changeover time. We recently returned to our client’s site to complete further planned upgrades to the process.
The problem
Following the upgrade of the cooler, our customer was now able to complete the further upgrades to the rest of the process. These planned upgrades were needed due to the age of the existing equipment which had become worn through many years of use. The completion of this phase of the project will make the rest of their production process more reliable, efficient, and further increase throughput.
Our solution
To support our client in their aims to achieve a more efficient mill, our team worked with them to plan some key upgrades that were imperative to reaching this goal – upgrades to the press, conditioner, crumbler and sieve.
The conditioner was a crucial part of the process as it adds steam and molasses to the meal product before it goes through the press to be pelleted. The pellets then come out into the newly upgraded cooler. The conveyor then transfers the product to the crumbler to either convert the pellets to a finer consistency for poultry feed, or this part of the process can be skipped if the product is needed as pellets. This is then transferred to the sieve where any dust is removed before being sent to the fat coater and then to storage bins ahead of dispatch.
Each part of this equipment aside from the upgraded cooler was outdated, so to ensure the process was running efficiently the customer sourced the specialist equipment from an Italian suppliers UK agent. We then designed the associated supporting steelwork using our in-house 3D modelling software, manufactured at our York facility, and completed the full installation of the new equipment.
The process
After planning an installation schedule that fit in with our customer’s production needs, we agreed that an overall 4-day shutdown would be needed to remove the old equipment and install the new. We arranged to do this in two separate visits, each for two days, across two installation teams. This was to reduce downtime and limit the impact on the customers production schedule:
Visit one: We removed the old press and conditioner, and installed the replacement equipment and steelwork, with the aid of a 300-tonne crane. This was supplied by Baldwins crane hire, and the necessary lift plans and risk assessments were carried out by us. During this shutdown, it also presented the perfect opportunity to replace the industrial fan which draws the air through the cooler to cool the pellets faster, to avoid a further shutdown at a later date.
Visit two: We removed the old crumbler and sieve and installed the new equipment, this time with the aid of a smaller 120-tonne crane.
The outcome
We were pleased to support our customer to fully upgrade their system and increase efficiency. Now that these upgrades are complete, up to 20 tonnes of product is going through the press per hour (an increase of more than 60% for the two projects combined!). We are looking forward to working on more projects with this client throughout 2025, which are currently in the planning stages! Check out some images of the project below:
