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Case Study – Wilkin & Sons Ltd

Wilkin & Sons Logo
Growing and preserving fruit since 1885

Location: Tiptree, Essex, United Kingdom

The Challenge:

Wilkin & Sons Ltd is a familiar brand and probably most of us would be familiar with their Jam, Marmalade & Honey products. In recent years they have been developing their Savoury range, which has been a huge success and is now stocked by most major supermarkets.

To keep up with increases in demand, Wilkin & Sons have built a new facility to pack these products and part of this expansion included the requirement for a new liquid filling machine. Universal has previously supplied liquid filling machines for sauces and jam, so were delighted to have the opportunity to get involved with this project.

Wilkin & Sons Ltd were looking for a machine that would fill glass jars from 25ml – 250ml at speeds up to 120 bottles per minute. The product range is wide with new recipes being added all the time and quick changeovers and repeatability were critical.

Products to fill:

  • Mayonnaise
  • Mustard
  • Chutney
  • Relish
  • Ketchup
  • Sauce

The Solution:

Equipment Supplied:

To achieve 120 bottles per minute would require a 12 head in-line or rotary filling machine. The client had a preference for an in-line system, so Universal suggested the Posimatic EV Servo 12 head fully automatic filling system. To achieve the desired repeatability, rapid changeovers and accuracy, the customer decided to purchase the servo driven machine over the standard pneumatically powered option. The settings for each product can be stored in the menu and retrieved within the push of a button, ensuring that each time a product is run it will be exactly the same as the last time.

Other alternatives:

The standard Posimatic EV1000 would also have been suitable for filling this range of products.

It is early days as the machine has only just been installed. Timescale was critical as the filling machine needed to be in position before the rest of the services could be installed and despite a tight schedule of only 12 weeks from order, Universal delivered the machine on time.

We chose Universal following two previous installations which have been successful. The machines are easy to operate and maintain and back up and service from a UK based company is essential when you cannot afford any downtime.

We are certain that this new machine will prove to be a huge success and we look forward to working with Universal again.