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Avoiding splashing during clean fill 
Liquid foods and drinks are prone to splashing at the point of fill. If not managed appropriately, this could lead to the growth of spoilage micro-organisms and deterioration of product quality after processing. Research is helping with the understanding and modelling of factors that influence splashing during clean filling of products. Clean filling uses technologies or conditions to reduce the level of product re-contamination and, although less stringent than aseptic filling, can nevertheless increase the shelf-life of chilled products ranging from milks, soups and sauces to fruit juices, fruit drinks and flavoured teas. Work to date has focused on reducing splashing during the filling operation. It has established that product viscosity and filler speed have the greatest influence on splashing. Other factors such as pot geometry and distance between filler head and pot only become significant at certain viscosities and filling speeds. A model has been developed to rank the adjustments that could be made to reduce splashing during particular filling operations. This will aid the design of new fillers and optimisation of existing systems to reduce splashing. Contact: Dr Karen Middleton |