Sensitivity, stability and customer trust vital in metal detection systems, says CEIA

The firm manufacturers metal detectors, conveyor belts and systems for pipeline for the food industry.

CEIA are using around 20% of their turnover to develop new systems to develop what is currently unknown about electromagnetic field.  

It is really important that the customer trusts the equipment, Emanuele Giardi, from the industrial metal detectors sales department at CEIA told FoodProductionDaily.com.

“There is nothing worse than to lose the trust in the equipment. Because when you are working in normal production if you have a lot of false alarms the customer loses the trust. So at the end it can let the pass through of metals thinking the equipment is faulty and this is what happens usually.”​

The firm’s THS Detectors allow the interception of magnetic and non-magnetic metals and feature an automatic tracking function which cancels out any variation in effect caused by the product under inspection.

For example, the THS/PL21 is designed for products transported in pipeline such as meat, soup and preserves while the THS/MN21 is aimed at products in aluminium foil trays and wrappings.

The company’s metal detectors for the food industry are based on military technology to discriminate against shape and kind of metal.

Daily contaminations ​

“It is really important to use a metal detector because in a normal production line there are about five contaminations per day, it seems a lot, but if we consider there are companies producing thousands of tons per day.​

"Yesterday it was to a company producing meat 55 tons per day of meat, so it's not a big quantity still but an important quantity.  ​

“The kind of contamination you can have in your production line are a lot because you are using machinery, we are using needles for animals, we are using chips for the traceability of the meat manufacturers so consequently the quantities of contaminations can fall down.”​

He said the equipment might be more expensive up front but it will save money in the long run because of production benefits and brand name protection.

‘Metal explosion’​

He added it was crucial that when there are these five contaminations thmetey are found and the customer trusts the metal detector that those contaminations are really inside the rejected product.    

“If we think about for example vegetables on the farm, animals that are eating from the grass, doctors that are using needles on the animals and it can happen that a needle is broken during the injection or if we think about the microchip that we use on the skin for traceability.​

“If we think about knifes that everyday are cutting, slicing and mixing meat, any moment the normal production the quantities of production can generate this kind of contamination that is not a crime, it is something that can happen.”      ​

He added ‘metal explosion’ was becoming more common and it was the worst because it is not a single contamination but one where a screw or needle falls down inside the production line and then the slicer or packaging machinery destroys this single part in many smaller pieces, which is much more dangerous due to the part sharpness.

Electromagnetic field​

Giardi added that they have to consider the community doesn’t know 100% of the possibilities that can be done with electromagnetic field.

The company are producing metal detectors that are working with many frequencies at the same time which keeps the stability as it can recognise product variation from metal contamination.

A metal detector with only one frequency is sensitive to product characteristic variation such as humidity, temperature and metallised foil thickness, he added.

“We really believe the metal detector is a new instrument and they are many possibilities to improve what actually we can do with the equipment.​

“Our main target is the equipment, we really believe if the equipment is well defined at the beginning before sale then it will not need support in the future as a metal detector is a fixed machine it does not have many moving parts, it is like a computer, so if a computer is good it can live for many times without technical service.”​