Mushroom Grower Increases Production Output by 5,000 lbs a Day Using Doran Checkweighers
The Challenge
Quality control verification and packaging accuracy
A large Mushroom grower needed a way to ensure that the tills of mushrooms were being filled to the proper weight and a means to verify the productivity of each employee. Since whole mushrooms vary in weight and size, the tills of mushrooms were filled by hand. They knew the weight of the bulk mushrooms and the total weight of all the mushrooms packaged that day, and they realized that almost 4% of product was lost or unaccounted for during the packaging process. This needed to be improved to keep a healthy profit margin for this company.
The Solution
The Doran 2200CW Checkweigher Scale with ethernet and Excelerator Data Collection Software
10 Doran 2200CW Checkweigh scales with wired Ethernet were installed in each production line (Seven total lines). They were connected to a PC with Doran’s CW Setup program which contained a library of all products with over and under tolerances.
The scales require the operator to log in with an employee ID; this allows all of their packaging for the shift to be recorded.
The line leader enters the product to be run in the CW Setup program which then uploads this information and over under tolerances to the 2200CW scales on that line.
After the 2200CW scales are setup with the product information and tolerances the Doran Excelerator program starts to collect the data on each weighment from each scale and each packer.
The 2200CW scales automatically send the last stable non-zero weight and data is recorded in Excel.
A production summary sheet is displayed on the PC so that management can have a quick way to determine the output of that line and the performance of each packer.
The Return on Investment
Five Months!
Using this system decreased the loss in production from almost 4% to an average of 1%. This resulted in a substantial savings for this company as shown below:
| Loss rate improvement: | 3% |
| Average shift production in pounds: | 25,000 lb |
| Shifts per day: | 1 |
| Average product cost per lb: | $0.22 |
Total Savings
| Product savings in pounds per day: | 3% |
| Product savings in pounds per year: | 25,000 lb |
| Total savings per day: | 1 |
| Total savings per month: | $3,300 |
| Total savings per year: | $39,600 |
The customer was thrilled to learn the return on investment for this system was realized in only five months.
