THE DATA COURIER

Omron RFID application stories

Episode 2: Quality control for food products

The problem for food producers has always been the demand for a high degree of safety. The importance of managing a wide variety of information, such as the date and place of production, the best-before date, and the destination direction is now greater than ever and has made quality control of foodstuffs very difficult. Food products cartons are in most cases cleaned with either alcohol, detergent, warm water or steam and so machines that have a low resistance to chemicals, high temperatures or that may allow bacteria to proliferate cannot be used.

The solution is simple, by mounting data carriers (ID Tags) that are housed in a double layer of PFA (Teflon) to the cartons or pallets, information can now be written to the tag. This can contain such data as the product name, weight, and the quantity, store information regarding the data and place of production, the best-before date and the destination direction for the product. The process also helps perform sorting and delivery work after confirming its safety using the production date and best-before date information obtained from the data carriers, then issuing a form itemising the relevant information.

The excellent results achieved applying these systems means that by reading the product name, weight, and quantity stored in the data carriers the producer has reliable, error-free delivery times that are itemised with less effort but greater efficiency. This is critical in the food industry where reliable quality control makes for easier history management and is important in its contribution to Hazard Analysis Critical Control Point (HACCP)

In this particular system the key model features of the V600-D23P66SP ID tags is their high resistance to chemicals and ability to withstand cleaning using alcohol (IPA) or detergent. These tags also have sufficient heat resistance to tolerate cleaning with warm water, steam or IPA. They have a large information capacity of 254 bytes allowing them to store basic foodstuff control information, which is suitable for most applications.

Micromech is the systems integrator for Omron RFID systems, if you wish to find out more contact Stirling Morley on 01376 333311 or stirling@micromech.co.uk

'Micromech, keeping track with Omron'