7 replies to this topic

[Peak]

13.2.11.3 Adjacent production equipment shall be covered or shut down and raw materials and finished goods shall be moved from the vicinity if using compressed air hoses to clean.

 

Can others share what they have done in order to comply with this?  What alternatives have been found to using compressed air?  Vacuums have not been working due to oil being present and clogging.  Has anyone tried movable curtains or walls so that adjacent equipment would be able to stay running?

[ctzinck]

we just said, no cleaning with compressed air...

[Peak]

Still looking for suggestions from others on how they have addressed this clause of the standard when it is unavoidable.

[Gerard H.]

Hi Teaners,

 

Not knowing the situation in your company, it's difficult to give the solution for you, but here are some ideas to study and to test:

• Carry out a research if there are vacuum cleaners which can also handle oil and the type of the clogging element you described (Note: keep vacuum cleaners clean after use, otherwise you can have a lot of other hygiene problems)
• Optimize the process to avoid that you need compressed air to clean the dirtiness. --> Optimizing = Reduce the generated dirtiness, place collection bins to avoid dispersion & apply hygienic design principles (by means of protection of difficult to clean parts of the machines or opening them (respecting safety!) to improve access)

Hopefully this gives you input, to better comply with the SQF and to apply some continuous improvement.

 

Kind regards,

 

Gerard Heerkens

[Charles.C]

Still looking for suggestions from others on how they have addressed this clause of the standard when it is unavoidable.

 

Hi Teaners,

 

Maybe you could supply a little more info. on yr actual process ?

[Peak]

We have machines lined up next to each other as shown below.  They are very low to the ground.  Oil and other materials get under the machines during normal production.  During the machine clearance process and housekeeping they will use compressed air to clear out under the machines.  We also have a piece of grinding equipment in line that gets blown out during change over.  This is so one does not have to touch the blades with their hands.  We have thought about removing the piece of equipment and replacing it with a already clean one but there is not enough room to move it in and out without having to move running aux. equipment.  They have tried utilizing vacuum systems but this has not worked out so far.   

 machines.jpg   79.61KB   0 downloads

 

 

 

[FurFarmandFork]

We have a similar setup with multiple packaging lines coming out of fillers. unfortunately our control process is just not to do the "blow out" with compressed air while other lines are running. We wait until they are down because there just isn't an effective way to make sure things don't get blown into the air where they could land in exposed bottles. Once the lines are down and all exposed packaging is put away they blow it out.

[Peak]

I wish it were that easy for us.  With our 24 hour operations there is not really a time when all machines are down to be able to do this.  I have been looking into some type of movable curtain but Im not sure if that will be sufficient or not.