X-ray vision system

ASF

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Hi all,

A friend of mine who works in a dairy processing plant asked me if I knew of a machine that might solve a particular problem. I don't know of anything, but perhaps someone on here will have run across something?

They recently suffered some contamination of 10,000-20,000 blocks of cheese. As the contaminant was non-ferrous, it wasn't detected by the metal detector, and since it was embedded within the cheese, the block looked normal externally and a vision system would not have helped.

Any of you fine folk come across an x-ray machine that might be able to tell the difference between a solid block of cheese, and a block of cheese with foreign material inside? I'm imagining a cross between an x-ray machine and a vision system, where the vision system can inspect not only the external shape of the object, but also the internals. But I'm not sure if that sort of thing even exists.
 
Never used one before, but found this little guy, which is an ultrasonic imager. https://www.imperiuminc.com/acoustocam-i600

If you end up testing one please let me know how it goes. Super interesting technology.

Shame the product name is an anagram of 600ci Auto-Scam, and the unit looks about 600cubic inches. (No apology is offered, should the joke be too cheesy)

Edit: I found some other ultrasonic imagers, which are just an ultrasonic directional microphone, rather than a multi-headed ultrasonic sonar probe. These other products would only be good for detecting noisy things like pipe leaks.
 
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i was an xray technician several years ago.
i need to ask some questions.
how big is the material you are going to xray?
is the product in containers, if so what type, how are they assembled.
what was the contaminates discovered? be specific?
how big were the contaminates? smallest to biggest

now for the production rate.
how much product will be xrayed at 1 time.
dimensions?
room temp?
how much rise in temperature can the cheese have?
how long will the xray line be for staging the product?

regards,
james
 
Never used one before, but found this little guy, which is an ultrasonic imager. https://www.imperiuminc.com/acoustocam-i600

If you end up testing one please let me know how it goes. Super interesting technology.

Shame the product name is an anagram of 600ci Auto-Scam, and the unit looks about 600cubic inches. (No apology is offered, should the joke be too cheesy)

Edit: I found some other ultrasonic imagers, which are just an ultrasonic directional microphone, rather than a multi-headed ultrasonic sonar probe. These other products would only be good for detecting noisy things like pipe leaks.


Ultrasonic is an interesting idea! I don't know if they'd be interested in trying something so "experimental" but I'll float the idea past them.

Also your cheesy joke, further compounded by the self-referential cheese reference, is significantly appreciated.
 
When I worked in a meat processing plant we had some x-ray machines made by MT/Safeline that worked pretty well once set up and "taught".

https://www.mt.com/us/en/home/products/Product-Inspection_1/safeline-x-ray-inspection.html

I don't recall which one we had, but I was impressed all except for how some of the internals were mounted when I had to replace a power supply.
That looks like the ticket! I've used a lot of MT weighing gear, and always been impressed with their quality and their technical support. Were you doing the same thing (i.e. looking for contaminants within a slab of meat)?
 
i was an xray technician several years ago.
i need to ask some questions.
how big is the material you are going to xray?
is the product in containers, if so what type, how are they assembled.
what was the contaminates discovered? be specific?
how big were the contaminates? smallest to biggest

now for the production rate.
how much product will be xrayed at 1 time.
dimensions?
room temp?
how much rise in temperature can the cheese have?
how long will the xray line be for staging the product?

regards,
james
Oooh, direct experience in the industry! This forum is great!

Unfortunately I have answers to exactly zero of these questions, as I've never even seen the factory. The enquiry just came from an old friend who lives interstate and knows I work in the industry. But I'll pass those questions on to him and indicate that he'll likely need to be answer all of those questions in order to procure a solution.

In broad terms, taking reasonable assumptions about the answers to your questions, does current x-ray technology allow for what he's trying to do?
 
Year ago I used an airport style xray machine coupled to an Allen-Bradley VIM module to detect powder level in 30mm bullets.


I see xray systems all the time at canning plants. Sorry I don't know the name of them. I will email the tech there and find out.
 
Consider Loma, Multivac, Heuft, do not go for the cheaper south east Asia models, support is not that good.
We used mainly Loma & Heuft, these are good but you need to talk to them to discuss the types of contaminants you are likely to want to detect.
I have seen systems that can detect glass as small as 5mm, chicken bones in soup, and many other types of contaminants, If the product is quite uniform like cheese then it may be possible to detect any foreign object providing it is not the same density as the product.
 
Hi all,

A friend of mine who works in a dairy processing plant asked me if I knew of a machine that might solve a particular problem. I don't know of anything, but perhaps someone on here will have run across something?

They recently suffered some contamination of 10,000-20,000 blocks of cheese. As the contaminant was non-ferrous, it wasn't detected by the metal detector, and since it was embedded within the cheese, the block looked normal externally and a vision system would not have helped.

Any of you fine folk come across an x-ray machine that might be able to tell the difference between a solid block of cheese, and a block of cheese with foreign material inside? I'm imagining a cross between an x-ray machine and a vision system, where the vision system can inspect not only the external shape of the object, but also the internals. But I'm not sure if that sort of thing even exists.

Tyson plant I worked at had one I think it was from Safeline. It was run by a small windows PC. It would pickup stuff the metal detector missed. Birdshot pellets, etc. Generally it was one or two pellets. It would also pick up gristle in the little 5LBs packs of TacoBell taco meat.
 
When I worked in a meat processing plant we had some x-ray machines made by MT/Safeline that worked pretty well once set up and "taught".

https://www.mt.com/us/en/home/products/Product-Inspection_1/safeline-x-ray-inspection.html

I don't recall which one we had, but I was impressed all except for how some of the internals were mounted when I had to replace a power supply.

Yep thats them. It was a safeline.

And the admin password is comically weak once you know the pattern...

if the displayed authentication request is 583628 you just do some math.. 999999-583628=416371.. the answer was the password. changed every minute.
 
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Were you doing the same thing (i.e. looking for contaminants within a slab of meat)?

Yes, it was all about detecting foreign materials including metal too small to be picked up magnetically.

It was small packets of sliced Canadian bacon. The rate was relatively slow. I think there were 4 lanes passing through the machine and a pack on each lane every 5 or ten seconds. It has been a few years so I am guessing. Or maybe the 4 lanes were merged single file through the x-ray? Yes, that sound more familiar.

The inspection took place after the packages were sealed, but before they were cartoned. The sliced sausage was packaged in vacuum formed sealed packs about 8 inches long, 4 inches wide, maybe 2 or 3 inches thick.

I wanna say that x-ray once detected a sliver of wood from a pallet that somehow flew up onto the line.
 

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