Super sorter for C.C.D. eggs

Press, 13 April 1984, Page 29

Super sorter for C.C.D. eggs

The first “new generation” electronic egg grading machine to be installed outside the United States, where it was developed, is operating at the Christchurch premises of Combined Co-operative Distributors, Ltd. The $500,000 machine is only the fifth of its type in the world and is the “state of the art” in grading and packaging of eggs. After a six-month installation and proving period for the new machine C.C.D. opened its factory for public inspection by growers and the press. The Diamond Egg Grading machine accepts eggs from growers’ trays, passes them in front of an electron-ically-facilitated "candling” section, weighs each egg, rejects those which have failed the candling and sorts the remainder into the retail and commercial grades. It also keeps a tally of the weight of acceptable eggs submitted by each grower and weighs so accurately that C.C.D.’s output is now well within the weight tolerances allowed by regulation for each grade. Throughput of the machine is 5200 dozen eggs

per hour and it is capable of 6000 dozen per hour. It processes the average weekly collection of C.C.D. (from Canterbury growers) of 150,000 dozen eggs per week within a five day working week. It has replaced four separate handoperated grading machines and considerably eased the burden of candling, which is a job requiring considerable concentration and dexterity. Now candling takes place in booths surrounded by tinted perspex where operators lightly touch rejected and commercial grade eggs with an electronic wand as they pass. The machine remembers the position of nominated eggs and deals with them appropriately in the sorting and weighing function. The C.C.D. domestic consumption requirement, for Christchurch and surrounding districts, is 80,000 to 85,000 dozen per week. This leaves an average weekly surplus of up to 70,000 dozen which has either to be shipped elsewhere in New Zealand or processed for domestic and export trade.