Super-food Avocado has now become a super powder used in cosmetic, nutriceutical and food products.
However it has also caused a couple of super cleaning problems!
Te Puna food manufacturer Avocado Oil New Zealand has developed Avo-pure, an avocado powder that is exported to the likes of the United States, Japan, China and Australia.
It contains high levels of potassium, fibre and vitamins.
They have been utilising an open access product development spray drier based at the state-of-the-art Waikato Innovation Park.
However, the process has caused a few production issues, which had Quality Manager Alejandro (Alex) Fernandez searching for solutions.
Firstly the Avocado is heated to extract the oil from the flesh. This was leaving a black/ burnt residue inside the metal containers. The pulp from this goes into a further process to be prepared for the spray drying process.
Alex had tried a range of cleaning methods including high pressure water blasting and a range of different chemicals, with no success.
One day he picked up a Food Technology publication and read a story about the success a food processor was having with Tenax. He then noticed the advert and made an enquiry.
“I’d read about it and then I went on to the Hygiene Technologies website to read more, so I thought we should give it a go,” said Alex.
Hygiene Technologies Sales Support Lincoln Field visited Alex and to see the problem first hand.
“It was as difficult a cleaning challenge that we had seen but we were confident Tenax would do the trick.
Alex started experimenting with Tenax at several concentrations, ending up at a rate that effectively softened the soil enough to be stripped off by the waterblaster.
“The process was to spray Tenax on, leave for 20 minutes, rinse with warm water and then water blast..
And the result …
“It works!” We’d been looking for something for a while and it was by chance that I read that article. We’ve now got a cleaning product that makes the metal containers easy to clean.
ABOUT Tenax
The principle behind the Tenax technology is that the chemical thickens when it is diluted to the correct percentage and consequently clings in a wet state to surfaces far better than foaming chemicals, thoroughly wetting out the soiled surface and solubilising the soil.
TENAX® chemicals have been designed to give prolonged adherence to vertical and horizontal surfaces, thereby making full use of the chemical energy available.
The outcome of this extended contact time is a superior cleaning/sanitation result to what has previously been available, which allows you to reduce the other inputs involved in cleaning, such as manual labour, hot water, and time.
For a trial of Tenax contact us to discuss your application.
You can also view our video case study of Tenax in action here