Cadburys – Hamilton, ON
Cadburys approached Jantz Canada with the challenge of combining the continuous process of forming chocolate egg cores with the batch process of applying the candy shell coating.
Up until this time they had been offloading the chocolate cores manually into trays for storage purposes. When ready for coating they would be loaded by hand into the coating drums to apply the candy shell. After the coating process they were again loaded in storage trays to await the colour combining process at the bagging stage. They hoped to eliminate all of these labour intensive procedures by combining everything into a seamless automated process. Automating the process would also allow for an increase in production as well as the decrease in labour costs.
One of the many challenges of this project was how to accumulate the mass of chocolate coming from the forming machine without causing any damage to the delicate product. The cores would be at a depth of more than a foot with an estimated weight of 200 lbs per linear foot of conveyor. There was a fear that the chocolate at the bottom would be deformed or damaged by the friction against the conveyor sides. How the product would react through different stages of the system required us to fabricate some test assemblies to research product flow.
Tailoring our products for a customer’s particular needs and research and development has always been standard practice at Jantz Canada so the bulk weight and potential damage issues were handled with unique solutions. The accumulation conveyors downstream of the coating drums needed to circulate air for hardening purposes throughout the product so those conveyors also were built with a new task specific design. This system is a showcase of Jantz Canada’s commitment to continual product development and customer satisfaction.
