LIME PACKING EQUIPMENT
The greater the accuracy of quality selection, the greater the future of your business.
Unisorting Limes Sort 3 technology, used in sorting and grading machines, enables you to select the desirable and undesirable characteristics of any kind of lime.
For each of these varieties of limes, Unisorting Limes Sort 3 technology can accurately select and classify the external and internal quality:
size, color and shape;
internal defects on fruit, i.e. flesh defects or damage;
external defects or peel defects;
internal and external valued characteristics of each fruit.
Unisorting Limes Sort 3 technology selects and classifies automatically, with extremely high reliability and efficiency standards.
Sorting, grading and processing machines designed and produced by Unisorting to sort and select limes, classify the different qualities of the fruits automatically with the utmost efficiency and with a considerable cost saving on the costs borne by Packing Houses for this sort of processing.
Unisorting Limes Sort 3 technology takes care of your limes and of your business.
Risk factors and loss prevention
RF Temperature
Limes require particular temperature, humidity/moisture and ventilation conditions (SC VII) (storage climate conditions).
A written cooling order must be obtained from the consignor before loading is begun. This order must always be complied with during the entire transport chain.
The following Table merely constitutes an estimate of appropriate temperature ranges. Temperatures may deviate from these values, depending on the particular transport conditions.
Designation Temperature range Source
Travel temperature 11.5°C [1]
10°C [3]
8 – 12°C [5]
Supply air 11°C [1]
Depending on the variety, the chilling damage temperature for limes is 5 – 12°C.
To ensure maximum transport and storage life, the fruit should be cooled immediately postharvest, as limes, like other citrus fruit, are susceptible to mold.
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RF Humidity/Moisture
Limes require particular temperature, humidity/moisture and ventilation conditions (SC VII) (storage climate conditions).
Designation Humidity/water content Source
Relative humidity 85 – 90% [1]
90% [3]
85 – 90% [5]
Water content 83 – 89% [1]
Maximum equilibrium moisture content 80% [1]
Limes must be protected from all forms of moisture (seawater, rain and condensation water), to prevent premature spoilage (mold damage).
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RF Ventilation
Limes require particular temperature, humidity/moisture and ventilation conditions (SC VII) (storage climate conditions).
Recommended ventilation conditions: circulating air, 60 – 80 circulations/hour with continuous supply of fresh air, to prevent excessive concentrations of CO2, ethylene and other gases.
The circulation fans must where possible be set to full power for the entire duration of transport. After the reduction period, it is essential to supply fresh air to keep the CO2 content below 0.2 vol.%.
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RF Biotic activity
Limes display 2nd order biotic activity.
They are living organs in which respiration processes predominate, because their supply of new nutrients has been cut off by separation from the parent plant.
Care of the cargo during the voyage must be aimed at controlling respiration processes (release of CO2, water vapor, ethylene and heat) in such a way that the cargo is at the desired stage of ripeness on reaching its destination. Inadequate ventilation may result in fermentation and rotting of the cargo as a result of increased CO2 levels and inadequate supply of atmospheric oxygen (see Ventilation).
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RF Gases
CO2 evolution CO2 evolution at 11°C: 13 mg/kg*h
Upper limit of permissible CO2 content 0.2 vol.%
Ethylene evolution
Active behavior The rate of ethylene production is very low, being below 0.1 µl/kg*h [16].
Passive behavior Limes are moderately sensitive to ethylene [16] (allelopathy).
If ventilation has been inadequate (frost) or has failed owing to a defect, life-threatening CO2 concentrations or O2 shortages may arise. Therefore, before anybody enters the hold, it must be ventilated and a gas measurement carried out. The TLV for CO2 concentration is 0.49 vol.%.
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RF Self-heating / Spontaneous combustion
No risk.
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RF Odor
Active behavior Limes have a strong, pleasant odor.
Passive behavior The cargo is highly odor-sensitive and must therefore not be stored together with odor-emitting products.
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RF Contamination
Active behavior Limes do not cause contamination.
Passive behavior The cargo is sensitive to dirt, fats and oils. The holds or containers must accordingly be clean and in a thoroughly hygienic condition before loading.
RF Mechanical influences
Because of its high impact- and pressure-sensitivity, the fruit must be treated with great care during cargo handling, transport and storage, since otherwise it will spoil prematurely.
RF Toxicity / Hazards to health
If ventilation has been inadequate (frost) or has failed owing to a defect, life-threatening CO2 concentrations or O2 shortages may arise. Therefore, before anybody enters the hold, it must be ventilated and a gas measurement carried out. The TLV for CO2 concentration is 0.49 vol.%.
RF Shrinkage/Shortage
The normal weight loss due to a reduction in the moisture content of the product is approx. 1 – 2% [1].
RF Insect infestation / Diseases
Blue mold rot or storage rot is the most feared storage disease of citrus fruits and is caused by two species of mold: green mold (Penicillium digitatum), which is of an olive-green color, and blue mold (Penicillium italicum), which is of a blue-green color. The fungal spores mainly penetrate through small injuries. Development is optimal at 20 – 27°C; growth still flourishes at 10°C and comes to a standstill only at 4°C. Blue mold is transferred from fruit to fruit by contact.
Seawater, rain and condensation water promote green and blue mold growth.
The quarantine regulations of the country of destination must be complied with and a phytosanitary certificate may have to be enclosed with the shipping documents. Information may be obtained from the phytosanitary authorities of the countries concerned.
Chilling damage is manifested in citrus fruits in particular by spots on the peel (brown dots on the peel), accompanied by a bitter taste and unpleasant odor, rot and cell wall collapse. The glossiness of the peel is lost and the albedo layer (inner layer of the peel), which is normally white, turns a dark color. When the fruit is divided up, the segments, which have a low juice content, break up and the whole fruit is glassy and soft. The severity of the chilling damage is determined not only by the extent to which the temperature has fallen beneath the limit, but also by the length of exposure to this temperature.
AUTOMATED LIME PACKINGCOST-EFFECTIVE AUTOMATIZATION CONCEPT DEVELOPED
High efficiency of the packing area is of great importance for profit-making operation of a sand lime bricks plant. The experts of WKB Systems worked out a special automatization concept that was successfully implemented on the production facilities of a large-scale German manufacturer of sand lime products. It is based on the usage of innovative facilities to boost the packing process flow, such as state-of-the-art machinery, robots, manipulators, gripping facilities, etc.
Our solution: Cost-effective automatization concept for a perfectly optimised packing process
Based on their long-term experience in the automatization and modernisation of sand lime bricks plants the engineers of WKB Systems came up to a decision to use two gripping facilities, one robot and a specially developed moving device for empty hardening trolleys taking into consideration a very compact ground area available.
AUTOMATED PACKING LINE
The operating cycle starts with the feeding of three types of wooden pallets via roller conveyors to the robot with a special gripper. It picks up two interlaced pallets and places one of them on a chain conveyor. Then the robot turns the gripper with another pallet by 180° and places it also on the chain conveyor. Thanks to the robot’s high flexibility it is possible to separate and precisely position wooden pallets of up to 25 kg each on the conveyer in an efficient way.
On the other side of the packing area the hardening trolleys loaded with sand lime bricks are forwarded to the portal gripping facility. It pushes the bricks together on the trolley to eliminate the spaces between them, takes and places them on two empty pallets prepared on the chain conveyor. So, one load of bricks on one trolley results in two packing units of height 800-1,300 mm and weight 2,200 kg.
After being strapped and stretched the brick packets are joined to one load and picked up with another portal gripping facility. It brings the load to an empty trolley to put it down. The whole cycle takes 40 seconds per packing unit.