Will tech trump custom at bakers and biscuit makers? | EUROtoday

A stream of scorching caramel runs by way of the Thomas Tunnock manufacturing unit simply outdoors Glasgow.

From the second flooring the place it’s made, it runs alongside conveyor belts right down to the primary flooring, bringing a a candy, heat aroma to the constructing.

But working with caramel shouldn’t be straightforward. Experienced employees should examine that it’s on the proper consistency, and it takes a group of 12 to unfold the caramel in 5 layers that make up the Tunnock’s wafer biscuit.

“We’re making roughly 20 tonnes of caramel a day,” says Stuart Louden, the agency’s engineering and transport supervisor, and the fifth technology of the Tunnock household to work on the enterprise.

“Operators do a lot of caramel testing, just on sight and on feel. So basically, they walk up to the caramel and just give it a squeeze.”

Once made, a conveyor belt takes the caramel right down to the ground beneath, the place the spreading group works.

“Spreading caramel onto wafers is very, very difficult because it’s so sticky,” says Mr Louden.

While it is a labour intensive a part of the Tunnock’s operation, a lot of the remainder of the manufacturing unit is automated.

The firm has at all times tried to make use of the most recent expertise to assist sustain with the competitors. Compared with the snack giants like McVitie’s or Fox’s, Tunnock’s is a small participant.

“We are a small fish in a big pond, and to try and keep up with some of these bigger companies that we are competing against, you’ve got to have the good machines there to get the output,” says Mr Louden.

They do have machines to unfold the caramel, which work at evening, however the human workforce is extra versatile and takes up much less area.

Between them, the machines and people prove round seven million wafer bars and 4.5 million tea desserts a 12 months.

Raising output generally is a balancing act for the agency, between sustaining their traditions and rising output.

For instance, like their caramel manufacturing, Tunnock’s marshmallow is made beneath shut human supervision.

Meanwhile, the wrapping of the wafer bar is folded across the product, moderately than sealed on the ends. If Tunnock’s switched to sealing then the manufacturing line may run extra rapidly.

“It’s a nice thing. If you give people a caramel wafer, and somebody’s not had one for 20 or 30, years, they go, ‘I remember having one of these when I was a kid’.”

The makers of a brand new robotic arm for the cake trade are hoping to bridge that hole between pace and custom.

Canada’s Unifiller, a part of Coperion a giant maker of kit for meals manufacturing, spent years creating a robotic arm, referred to as HIRO.

It’s designed to brighten desserts and may deal with all kinds of toppings, together with caramel.

“If you can squeeze it through a pastry bag… then it will go through our equipment and the the decorating tips,” says Derek Lanoville, the analysis and growth supervisor at Coperion.

But making tools for the meals trade includes further challenges – maybe the largest being hygiene.

“You have to make things easy to take apart, so that people clean them. The bottom line is, if it’s not easy to take apart, you don’t clean it.”

Unifiller’s robotic arm comes from Swiss robotics agency Stäubli, which may provide an arm that is straightforward to scrub.

Another complication is the variability of meals merchandise like desserts.

On manufacturing strains in most industries parts would be the identical measurement, typically to inside fractions of a millimetre. That’s not the case in baking, the place the desserts rolling down a line can be completely different – not by a lot – however sufficient,maybe, to upset a robotic.

“The cake may not be perfectly centred on the cardboard it’s sitting on. It may be a little bit oval, may be a little bit higher or slightly domed. So, our solution has to accommodate that,” says Mr Lanoville.

For Anomarel Ogen, human fingers are nonetheless important to the baking course of.

Mr Ogen is head baker at The Bread Factory, which is the place merchandise for the café chain Gail’s are baked.

Their bakery in northwest London runs 24 hours a day and twelve months a 12 months, supplying sourdough loaves to Gail’s, in addition to supermarkets, outlets and eating places.

It makes use of round 16 tonnes of flour to supply as much as 40,000 loaves a day, which seems like rather a lot however, in contrast with the enormous bakers, remains to be a medium-sized enterprise.

Machines combine the dough and divide it into into smaller, loaf-sized portions.

They use a spread of flours which can be farmed utilizing sustainable strategies that prioritise soil well being.

Mr Ogen says which means their dough is delicate. We watch one in all their employees forming loaves from the dough.

“Look at his hands, and look how gentle he actually is with the movement, how little pressure he is actually putting in. That requires years of skill. This is not fully replaceable by machines just yet,” says Mr Ogen.

Having workers within the manufacturing unit additionally provides flexibility to the manufacturing course of. If the recipe is tweaked, they’ll monitor the impression that has on the dough and alter the baking course of, if obligatory.

“You can automate more, but you still need to put in gatekeeping right along the path, to make sure that you can safeguard the process,” says Mr Ogen.

Introducing new tech to a manufacturing line is at all times a steadiness, says Craig Le Clair, principal analyst on the analysis agency Forrester, and in addition the writer of Random Acts of Automation: How to Fight Back When Automation Threatens Your Work, Your Life, and Everything You Do.

“The key in food as well as other industries is developing a hybrid model that integrates automation without losing the “soul” of a handcrafted product, like a decorated cake.

“Process transformation should apply automation solely to areas that profit from consistency, pace, and quantity, whereas retaining core value-add parts strictly human,” he says.

Back at equipment maker Coperion, Mr Lanoville has plans to develop the robot arm further.

“What we’re centered on this 12 months is de facto nailing down our scanning, imaginative and prescient and and security programs in order that, in order that our our clients can work the way in which that they work, with out the robotic being intrusive.”

Meanwhile in Glasgow, Mr Louden has plans to upgrade his production line, but much hinges on the financial environment. Cocoa prices have been volatile over the past two years, which has a big impact on his firm.

“When it involves investing one other two-and-a-half million kilos in tools, we simply want to attend, as a result of the final couple of years simply haven’t been the proper time, and we do not wish to put ourselves financially ready that it may harm us.”