Baking & Snack - November 2004 - 27

ᮡ Traveling depositor heads portion filling on every other row of baked
crackers before a set of vacuum cups (left) picks and places the corresponding
top cracker to complete the sandwich.
defining the dimensions. After the bars set in a controlledatmosphere tempering tunnel, circular roller knives cut
the mass into individual ribbons and an ultrasonic blade
divides the ribbons into individual bars.
Additional plans for the bar line include an enrobing
system that will be installed on a sliding track that
currently holds a stand-alone transfer conveyor. The
chocolate melter and enrober, already in-house, were
scheduled to be installed by the middle of November.
"When we produce enrobed products - bottom only
or fully enrobed - we will simply slide the existing
conveyor out of the way and move the enrober into place."
Additionally, the company is investigating equipment to
horizontally slice the bars into an upper and lower half.
Fillings such as creme, jam or caramel would be placed
on the lower half and capped by the upper half, forming
a 3-layer product.
The granola line was added earlier this year, and
production fit snugly into the existing structure, with
some modification to walls that isolate the pretzel and
cracker ovens from the center bar line's refrigerated
tempering system. The company's 45,000-sq-ft packaging
and material storage area houses an ultra-modern, fully
automated SIG Packaging setup.
The packaging system incorporates several SIG
components including a Sapal product accumulating
conveying system, two Systegra wrappers with smart
conveyors and dual Demaurex delta robotic pick-andplace systems. The robots, each running 400 bars per
minute, take two sets of three bars and place them into
pre-opened top-loaded cartons off a Bradman Lake
former and closer system. The cartons are then sealed
and packed 12 per case. An ABF carton erector forms

30 / BAKING & SNACK / November 2004

the shippers and twin Fanuc Robotic systems load the
cases, mimicking the human motion of bending back the
shippers' four flaps before loading the boxes.
The packaging system currently has two wrapping
lines feeding off the cooling conveyor following the online
Safeline checkweigher/metal detector. A third wrapping
line, scheduled for installation early next summer, will
act as backup to the other two and will take up any slack
during peak production, according to Mr. Leclerc. "It also
will give us more flexibility during scheduled changeover
or unscheduled maintenance on another wrapping line."
To help speed start-up of both the cracker and bar
lines, Mr. Leclerc temporarily transferred two key
people from the company's Canadian operations. "My
goal ultimately is to focus exclusively on US sales and
marketing and turn over operational control to Jim and
George and their staffs. Lemoine Lemoena and Paula
Cantin will help speed this transfer."
Mr. Lemoena, senior vice-president of Canadian
operations at Leclerc, came back with the packaging
employees and is stationed in Montgomery as a specialist
to assist in the continuing ramp-up and new product
introductions. He has been with Biscuits Leclerc for
more than 25 years. Ms. Cantin is with the company's
R&D group. She is in charge of R&D and product
implementation at Montgomery.
CRANKIN' OUT CRACKERS. The cracker line was
added in 2003 within the existing plant space. The line
is a complete Spooner-Vicars fully automated, fully
integrated production system. Leclerc USA uses the
48-in.-wide line to produce bite-size sandwich crackers,
although the system has the capability to produce nonsandwich mini or larger-sized crackers as well.
"This was a totally new venture for the company,"
Mr. Leclerc said. "With completely different dough
characteristics, we sought a system with a high degree of
automation. This line is fully automated from mixing to
cooling. It requires only one person to watch the line."
To expedite ramp-up once installed, the bakery sent
its operations team to Spooner-Vicars' test center in
Manchester, England, for pre-installation testing, and the
supplier helped tweak final formulations. In addition,
four times per year, the equipment supplier sends a
technician to Montgomery for additional employee
training and machine maintenance.
Cracker doughs are mixed on a mezzanine above the
laminating and sizing rollers. The mixer is a unique
design that includes a static sprag, or spike, in the bowl
that acts to significantly reduce mixing times - by as
much as 40%, according to the supplier. Incorporated
into the spike is a temperature probe that allows the
operator to monitor dough temperature in the center
of the mixing dough vs. the edge of the mixing bowl,

Baking & Snack - November 2004

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