Automating the weighing and bagging of potatoes has taken a step forward with a joint initiative between Tong Peal and Pacepacker Services.

One of the two firms’ first UK installations is for a Shropshire potato grower, with an electronic weigher feeding potatoes into 25kg bags on the sack conveyer belt. Then synchronised control of both the top and base of the bags avoids misalignment to ensure neat, even stitching before they move on to a palletising system.

The Tong Peal 2520 is suitable for bag weights of 10-50kg, handling up to 600 bags/hour. The Pacepacker system, meanwhile, is designed to provide fast and accurate bag closing, using a mechanism that holds the bag top at all times before sealing. The system can handle a wide range of materials from paper and plastic to woven polypropylene and hessian, and also thinner sacks which reduces the cost of packaging.