Founded in 1927, Norwegian-based company Honningcentralen is a key player in the production and distribution of honey, and has experienced steady growth over the years. As part of the company’s continued aim to supply good quality honey, a metal-edge industrial filter with a 63 micron wedgewire screen was built into the new production line to remove foreign bodies such as wax and bee wings from the honey. The existing filter was inefficient, continually requiring manual cleaning resulting in downtime and loss of production time.
Recognising that they were losing valuable time and profitability from this process, Honningcentralen sought to find a solution. Russell Finex was recommended by Honningcentralen’s subsidiary office in Sweden. “Our sister company in Sweden had an industrial filter from Russell and they were very happy with it,” says Hege Bjørnbakk, Production and Quality Manager at Honningcentralen in Norway.
Drawing on their experience in dealing with honey, Russell Finex assessed the requirements of the company and recommended an industrial filter from the Self-Cleaning Russell Eco Filter range. With its easy-clean design, the filter is simple to assemble and disassemble without the need for tools. This is a particularly useful feature for the company due to the characteristics of each strain of honey requiring a different screen size.
With a more accurate filter screen and its SpiroKlene wiper system, this self-cleaning industrial filter has successfully eliminated the problems previously experienced by Honningcentralen. The SpiroKlene system continuously cleans the surface of the filter element, meaning frequent blockages are no longer occurring. In addition, the pressure problems they were experiencing have been eradicated as oversize material can be manually discharged.
Following the successful installation of the filter, Honningcentralen also purchased a Filter Management System. This system automates the discharge of the oversize material from the filter, eliminating operator involvement and increasing productivity even further.