Top 10 Ways to Improve Your Food Safety Audit Results When Working with Conveyors and Related Components

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Top 10 Ways to Improve Your Food Safety Audit Results When Working with Conveyors and Related Components

  • Conduct a Hazard Analysis and identify Critical Control Points. Establish corrections and measures to improve your process and ensure better food safety.   Understand the Seven Principles of HAACP and implement them.
  • Prepare by doing some pre-audits. Perform a self-assessment and focus on any negative aspects of previous audits first.  Make sure those areas have been corrected.  Identify any new areas of concern by inspecting newly installed conveyors/equipment since your last audit.  Make sure new equipment meets the criteria of good food safety design.
  • Consider replacing conventional motors and gearboxes with self-contained drum motors or motorized pulleys on your conveyors.  These eliminate grease, bearings, chains and drip pans.
  • For conveyor belt sprockets, consider using sprockets made of Acetal. Acetal is wear-resistant, strong and the easiest to clean.  Acetal is a better choice than nylon for sprockets since nylon material is weaker and can potentially absorb water.
  • Use conveyor belt sprockets with an improved design that eliminates harborage points. A more open sprocket design is generally easier to clean with high pressure washdowns by eliminating potential harborage points that can collect grime and debris.
  • Consider replacing keyed square shafts and individual sprockets with one-piece Sanitary Drives. These Sanitary Drives are easier to clean, offer full width belt engagement and there are no individual parts to potentially break off and get into your products.
  • Consider replacing modular plastic belting with one-piece (Monolithic) belting. Monolithic belting is ideal for RTE (Ready to Eat) food production since it eliminates the hinges found in typical modular plastic belting every 1 to 2 inches.
  • Consider using edge capped PVC or PU belts that eliminate fabric fray on belt edges. Edge Capping encapsulates the fabric of PVC and PU so the edges cannot fray.   Exposed fabric on belt edges can potentially wick in liquids and provide an ideal place for bacteria to live.
  • For incline belt applications, consider Thermogienic Flights. These flights are RF welded to the base belt and are much easier to clean.  The flights do not have any harborage points because they are designed to be seamless and have a rounded top.
  • Improve your conveyor frame design. Consider eliminating hollow tubing, exposed threads, minimizing flat surfaces and utilizing easily removable components.  This type of sanitary designed conveyor frame will enable faster and more thorough cleaning and sanitizing.

Call for help with hygenic conveyor belt equipment.

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