The world's first digital food decoration system comes out

SPECTRA's Technology Synthesis Division presented its latest digital food decoration system, the Merlin FG, at the 2005 International Packaging Fair in Düsseldorf, Germany. Exhibitors reached an incredible number of 174,000 at the seven-day expo.

Merlin FG is the world's first high-speed, non-contact imaging system for digital decoration of biscuits, nutcrackers, snacks, wafer foods, crispy foods, sweets and other baked goods, confectionary foods and everyday foods. mark.

The digital decoration performs direct non-contact imaging and decoration on the product at full production speed without any intermediate steps. Pre-stored images, text, and logos can be imaged repeatedly or transformed from one side to the other. Merlin FG uses colorants that meet the US Food and Drug Administration's food grade, vivid images.

At the 2005 International Packaging Exposition, visitors to the SPECTRA kiosk saw the magic of Merlin's magic. It decorated many different types of food. The following day, many visitors returned to test their own food samples, such as sandwiches, cheese, white chocolate and candy. Some visitors want to verify market ideas or just want to see how their food is well imaged. For other visitors, they are curious about how likely it is to image the food with such a peculiar and unique system.

Merlin's performance far exceeds that displayed at the fair. In actual production, ink jetting is a non-contact imaging method and images, colorants, and fragrances are sprayed onto the product at the most appropriate stage of the production process. Allow imaging to take place while food is still warm, fresh, wet, liquid or undercooked. In this way, the storage, cooling and drying processes can be used to fix the colorant to the food prior to packaging. The sprayed colorant is dried by absorption or evaporation, etc. to create a long-lasting image on the food.

Merlin FG is rated 4X by the International Electrical Manufacturing Association and uses the world's leading Spectra piezoelectric drop-on-demand inkjet technology. This system complies with the standards set by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. At the expo, Merlin FG demonstrated effective imaging operations in a single, narrow, 2.8-inch print area at a speed of 500 feet per second. This system is designed to operate in full-scale production without impeding its overall effectiveness.

Merlin's modular system architecture can be enhanced to accommodate multiple production façade lines, wider print widths, or both, thus dramatically increasing overall system productivity. In one configuration, it was surprising to be able to image 65,000 cookies in one second.

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