Miller Magazine Issue 137 May 2021

44 MILLER / may 2021 NEWS Gericke has designed and delivered several dense phase conveying systems for transporting dry rice to fill- ing lines. These systems fully preserve the quality of the fragile rice grains and increase the overall process safety and reliability. For a major food producer Gericke had the challenge to replace mechanical transport systems with pneumat- ic conveying systems. The goal was to prevent any for- eign bodies often associated with mechanical systems and at the same time not to change the grain sizes of the various rice types for example long grain, basmati and risotto rice. During the evaluation phase Gericke demonstrated conveying trials that replicated the clients process at its major test facility in Regensdorf (Switzerland) that a low velocity dense phase plug conveying system is perfectly suited to smoothly convey rice over distances of up to 70 m. The achieved product quality convinced the customer as well as the fact that no external air injection system was required. In order to achieve the best product quality a contin- uous conveying system using a twin pressure vessel system, PTAD was chosen, as no expansion cycle with increased velocities could occur. The vessel sizes were also kept small to satisfy the limited available height be- low the existing collecting hopper, from which the differ- ent rice types are filled by the upstream process. Several conveying systems type PTAD are now deliv- ering rice to the packaging lines which are located 20 m to 70 m away and at capacities from 6 t/h to 15 t/h. The Swiss Gericke Group has been designing and manufacturing equipment and systems for modern bulk material processes, as well as providing design and consultation services, for more than 125 years. Ger- icke bulk materials processing technology can be found throughout the world in many sectors including the food, chemical, pharmaceutical, plastics and construction ma- terial industries. Gericke’s fully owned group companies employ more than 300 experienced professionals and are located in Switzerland, Germany, Great Britain, The Netherlands, France, USA, Brazil, Singapore, Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand and China. Gericke delivers pneumatic conveying systems to transport rice