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New programming, controller restores efficiency

Fruit and vegetable canner finds that a proactive upgrade on its tray packer/shrink-wrapper system brings quick payback.

Above, a new SLC now sits at the bottom of the controls cabinet for Truitt Bros.' tray-packer/shrink-wrapper system, replacing a
Above, a new SLC now sits at the bottom of the controls cabinet for Truitt Bros.' tray-packer/shrink-wrapper system, replacing a

It’s likely that Truitt Bros., a Salem, OR, fruit and vegetable canner, isn’t the only company operating tray packing equipment that’s more than 20 years old. In fact, its line—tray former, film overwrapper, and heat tunnel—remains a workhorse for the canner. A recent upgrade of its control system keeps that machine in regular operation.

Although the company had become skillful at maintaining the mechanical parts of the equipment, its control system remained a mystery to Truitt’s electricians. In part, that was because the equipment was built in Germany, and some of the controls documentation was presented in German, not English.

Still, until about a year ago, the equipment performed well. That’s when a glitch arose in tray handling at the stacking station: two correctly stacked trays were not released into the film wrapper, so the next tray crashed into them, creating a jam that required manual removal of cans and trays. At first, it was an infrequent problem, but not one that could be anticipated.

Electrical supervisor Greg Archibald suspected a programming defect. “We couldn’t do much maintenance on the control system, especially the programming, so we couldn’t even identify where the problem might be,” he says. “In addition, we were having greater difficulty in getting replacement parts.”

However, what really worried Archibald was when he heard about another food processor that had a PLC failure. “That company really scrambled to find another processor for its machine—all the while the machine was down. When we realized that our machine and processor was about the same vintage, we really became concerned,” Archibald recalls.

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