5 replies to this topic

[hygienic]

Dear All;


Debate; Which one is moret required to be available in the food catering , X ray machine or Metal detector?


Regards
Hygienic

[Simon]

Please advise Hygienic.

[Kiran]

Please advise Hygienic.

IMO, it will depend on the specific application details - what is the type of food, packaging (if any), how it is handled etc.

[Zeeshan]

Dear All;


Debate; Which one is moret required to be available in the food catering , X ray machine or Metal detector?


Regards
Hygienic

Adding to Kiran's comments, the decision also depends on following factors:

1- The local regulatory / statutory requirement. IMO, having metal detector is must, where there is no valid justification to have not, in most of the regions. X-Ray detector is optional in such cases.

2- Cost factor. X-ray detectors are far far more expensive than metal detectors.

Regards:
M.Zeeshan

[GMO]

In catering; neither. You can't expect someone to metal detect something in a kitchen, it's not practical and the fact much of the preparation will be done by hand makes the risks lower.

In industrial food production, it's dependent on the risks in your product and your product packaging. Here are a few scenarios and the decisions I would take.

Scenario 1; you are a small producer with small production runs. Decision? Use metal detection. It's cheap, effective and easily understood.

Scenario 2; you are introducing a product with a metalised film or produced into a foil tray. Decision? Use x-ray detection. You could use ferrous in foil metal detection, however, this will not detect non ferrous or stainless steel which are far more common in the food industry than ferrous.

Scenario 3; you are a very large food company and can't get the sensitivity you would like with metal detection. Decision? Use x-ray detection as it is normally more sensitive.

Scenario 4; the metal contamination you're worried about is likely to be thin, e.g. metalised tape. Decision? Use metal detection. It tends to be more sensitive to thin pieces of metal than x-ray (note that many 'detectable' plasters aren't x-ray visible for this reason.)

Scenario 5; you have foreign body contaminants other than metal you'd like to detect. Decision? Use x-ray detection, however, there is a big but

BUT

See? There it is! Seriously, x-ray detection can detect other contaminants but you need to ensure that it can detect the contaminant you're interested in and that you can buy (or make) suitable test cards for that purpose. There is a lot of tosh written about the ability to detect glass for example. Yes it can but all the test cards are soda glass. How much soda glass is in your site? I'll tell you. None. Ditto with plastics. Plastics vary greatly in density and so you need the right kind of plastic. Whether you can then detect it or not will depend upon the density difference between your product and the plastic.

[Kiran]

Let me first add that I am from x-ray manufacturing company.

If the catering operation is on industrial scale/ supplying to airlines etc. then it would be good to have metal detection, what option is selected will depend on various factors.

As for glass and other non-metallic contaminants, it is better to check using your own potential contaminants. e.g. in glass jar lines, you can use glass pieces from the same type of jar glass rather than soda lime.