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By Ad Bal
The Moba Omnia has been on the market for quite some years already and is used by customers all over the world. The modular type Omnia machine is found in packing stations who are handling eggs from external sources, or in large egg producing companies with their own egg handling facilities.Here eggs are supplied directly from the layer houses.“Based on the experiences with Omnia over the years, the machine has been redesigned in various generations and fine-tuned time and time again”, says product manager Paul Buisman of Moba. “As a result, it now is a machine which is combining the highest possible output with the best possible egg quality. That’s where both producers and retailers are benefiting from.”
Customers who are using the most recent generation of the Omnia confirm that they are getting up to 2% more grade eggs into the final packs, often referred to as 2% more grade A eggs. That is quite something. “It may make the difference between sometimes even loss or good profit”, says Buisman. Enormous savings can be made if the number of cracks is minimised. Even eggs that are sensitive, like from older hens, may end up at the end customer without any cracks. This is a matter of handling them carefully and that is the secret of the Omnia.
Good balance needed
This success has to do with an accumulation of many apparently minor aspects”, Buisman continues. Every step counts and that makes the difference. This starts from the moment the eggs arrive in the grading and packing station, either on a conveyor belt from the layer houses, or in trays from external suppliers. Also a combination of both is possible. In the case of external supply, trays are unstacked and put on a plateau conveyor from which the suction grip heads of the loader will gently transfer them to the infeed conveyor. This goes in such a way that there is no difference in speed between the roll conveyor and the eggs themselves.
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| Unstacked trays are put on a plateau conveyor from which the suction grip heads of the loader will gently transfer them to the infeed conveyor. |
The construction of the grip heads allows handling of both small and large sized eggs. If the eggs arrive inline from the layer houses, they are evenly distributed on a conveyor from where they are guided into lanes. The speed of this conveyer is lower than of the so called accumulator which is the next step. Thanks to this principle, the eggs will touch each other only to a limited extent. Hardly any build up of eggs will occur, which otherwise would have been a major cause of collision and cracks. This is also thanks to the special shape of the partitions between the lanes. Yet sufficient supply is needed to keep the machine running. So a good balance between supply and infeed volumes is essential.
Individual handling
From the moment the eggs have arrived at the rollers of the infeed conveyor belt, the individual handling is a fact. Windows and Linux based software of the Omnia, precisely registers from which batch the eggs are coming and controls the eggs until the final destination in the pack. This can even be from various sources at the same time. Once at the rollers of the conveyor, every egg is monitored and registered individually, allowing very precise traceability. If demanded, optional visual pre-candling can be done in the accumulator area.
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| In the transfer phase, the eggs are picked up by grippers in which they are weighed simultaneously. |
The special design of and distance between the rollers provides gentle transport to the transfer section. Prior to that stage, the eggs pass through the well known electronic crack detection module of Moba. Depending on the demands of the customer, also UV disinfection may take place in a special module. The shape of the rollers also provides easy cleaning. Optionally, a so called hygienic infeed conveyor is available, which has a set of two individual rollers for every egg. This avoids many eggs becoming dirty in the event of one leaking or broken egg.
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Source: World Poultry, Vol. 27, No. 8, 2011
