With the inauguration of the first Kündig Food Safety Tower® (KFST) in 2016 the Kündig Nahrungsmittel GmbH & Co. KG in Ritschenhausen laid the foundation stone for a new generation of raw material purification and optical sorting. For the first time, a fully automatic run through all cleaning steps was made possible in a single system. Inspired by the great success of the original, Kündig has also been operating a second plant since December 2018.
Although the biggest changes to the new Food Safety Tower are not immediately apparent, they make a great difference. The principle of multi-stage sequencing of different purification steps is retained and further optimized by the use of a new X-ray machine. The new X-ray technology allows the product loss rate to be further reduced. Compared to the first KFST®, the required cleaning time after a product has passed through could be reduced to a few hours. This allows contract services to be performed efficiently even with smaller quantities. As with the first KFST®, the various stages of raw material purification extend over several floors in a vertical arrangement. The closed system and the stainless-steel design guarantee maximum product safety from receipt of the goods to packaging.
Stefan Birzele, Head of Production at Kündig Germany, also sees the new plant as a major technological advancement: «The food industry’s requirements for product purity are becoming increasingly complex. Since classical raw material purification is reaching its technological limits here, we had to react accordingly at Kündig. A system like the KFST®, which combines all possible purification steps, was not known until then. With this new upgrade, we are strengthening the pioneering role we had assumed years ago with the first Food Safety Tower. We were able to reduce product loss even further and, especially thanks to the shorter cleaning time, we would like to address a clientele that also wants to have smaller quantities of plant-based food ingredients purified at a high level.»
With the two Kündig Food Safety Towers®, Kündig is setting new standards in raw material purification for the entire industry. You can find out more about how the KFST® works here.
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