Masosine Pump Preferred For Condensed Milk Handling

MasoSine SPS 2.5 Sine PumpThe pump’s innovative sinusoidal rotor overcame the limitations of a previously-considered rotary lobe pump to produce powerful suction with low shear, low pulsation and gentle handling. All in all, perfect for the company’s new toffee sauce.

As the ingredients and flavours ‘arm’ of Kerry Foods, everything produced at the 300+ employee Tenbury Wells plant is shipped for use at other sites. Known within Kerry as ‘wet-sweet systems’, the factory (unsurprisingly) specialises in wet and sweet products that typically include soft jams (termed ‘yogfruit’), chocolate sauces for cakes, pie fillings, and commercial jams for doughnuts.

Kerry is one of the leading and most technologically advanced manufacturers and innovators of application-specific food ingredients and flavours in the world. However, when the plant wanted to introduce a new toffee sauce to its 10 production lines, the company was faced with the challenge of pumping condensed milk. Initially, volumes were small, typically 1-2 batches at a time, and so Kerry could use manual labour to perform the necessary operations. However, demand grew quickly and it soon became apparent that a more automated pumping solution was required.

“As luck would have it we already had a MasoSine SPS 2 on trial for another, completely different application,” explains the site’s Process Manager, Charles Bishop-Miller. “It was being used for a thinner liquid stream that was also sometimes thick. As a result, we had the bright idea of seeing whether it could handle condensed milk.”

The process engineering team at Tenbury Wells set about installing the MasoSine SPS 2, to safely pump the milk from the production line into a cooking vessel.

“Having seen the light work it made of transferring condensed milk, I truly believe it could handle almost anything we throw at it,” says Mr Bishop-Miller. “We briefly considered using a conventional rotary lobe pump, but dismissed the idea for a number of reasons.”

Generally, rotary lobe pumps fail to provide enough suction to perform priming operations. Furthermore, the handling capability of lobe pumps can be quite harsh, offering uneven flows.

“Ultimately, we estimate the sine pump offers 20% faster pumping times than the lobe pump. It has also allowed us to redeploy the manual labour resource to a more value-added role,” explains Mr Bishop-Miller. “Greater versatility, self-priming ability and ease-of-cleaning also stack in favour of the MasoSine pump. In terms of the latter, we can remove the front and be hosing out in a matter of minutes.”

With hygiene and product quality two factors of paramount importance at food manufacturing plants, pumps often require stripping down for cleaning in accordance with rigorous cleaning schedules. MasoSine pumps can be dismantled and cleaned, and ready to go again in about 20 minutes. No special skills or tools are required and the task can be completed by production line operatives rather than maintenance engineers. The pumps offer full clean-in-place and steam-in-place compliance, with all wetted metallic parts made of 316L stainless steel.

With the process fully proven at Tenbury Wells, the decision has since been made to purchase a MasoSine pump, with Mr Bishop-Miller opting for a slightly larger capacity SPS 2.5 model which offers even higher maximum flow and maximum pressure capabilities.

SPS series pumps offer capacity up to 91.2 m³/hr and pressures up to 15 bar. With a single shaft and rotor, there is no need for the complex timing gears and multiple seals associated with rotary lobe pumps.