PASTA SHOPPE

Case Study
Lowe Industries masters the science of dough mixing and manufactures custom designed mixing machines for the Pasta Industry.

Scott Jones 5/4/2009

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PASTA SHOPPE
Lowe Industries Masters the Science of Dough Mixing
Custom design US-made mixing machine for the Pasta Industry

Company profile
Since 1994 the Pasta Shoppe in Nashville, TN has been making over 45 different themed pasta shapes including Home Sweet Home and Cold Cash. That same year they kicked off the manufacture of various college and university mascots and logo shapes. Whatever the shape, the all-natural pasta kicks off with 100 lbs. of fresh, high-glutton, durum wheat Semolina flour. For batches where color is necessary, a powdered colorant is added, for example a tomato-based color. Next egg whites are added with very little water with the goal of being not too wet or not too dry. We need the dough mixture just right to be able to pull it through our tooling equipment to end up with a really strong shape thats still wet commented Pasta Shoppe President and CEO, John Aron. After the dough has been mixed it is run through a specific dye to obtain the shape. The key with the dough mixture is to develop a porous noodle because that soaks up more sauce. Pasta Shoppe has it down to a science packaging up to a million pieces of unusual pasta for pasta fans every day. They have the selection that cannot be found anyplace else. It is their niche market.

Business situation
Pasta Shoppe was previously mixing pasta dough in two smaller mixers which took too long to process. Batch quantities were necessary to meet a demand of over a million pasta pieces per day. Pasta Shoppes objectives were: Shorter mix times. Increased production reliability. Faster dough development. Reduction in energy consumption. Increased automation.

Pasta Shoppe contacted Lowe Industries who manufacture stainless steel mixing equipment for the processing industry.

Technical situation
During the development of the pasta dough mixer design, Lowe consulted with industry expert Carlo Varesco. Mr. Varesco has worked within the US pasta industry for over 45 years. Together Lowe and Carlo designed and built a portable test mixer for use by prospective customers.

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Based on Pasta Shoppes application requirements, the test mixer was modified with the appropriate configuration of agitator, liquid addition spray manifold system and integral control panel. A free trial mixer was scheduled and shipped to the Pasta Shoppe plant in Nashville, TN for a 3-week test. In addition, Lowe sales engineer, Jeff Evans visited the Pasta Shoppe plant to learn more about their processing system. These events are part of our exclusive 6 step development process, commented Evans, which include: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. Identifying Needs Research Testing Design Custom Manufacture Customer Service

Challenges
Some unique challenges that Pasta Shoppe had requiring custom design mixer solutions included the following: 1. Dough Movement Making sure agitator paddles are aligned for balanced placement and pitch. 2. Clean-Up Challenges Labor content on a 20 minute mix, post flour dumping, is about 3 minutes of scraping, and 3 minutes of pushing bottom of hopper dough into the discharge hole. In addition, end of day scrape down of the paddles could take up to 35 minutes. 3. Efficient liquid addition dough hydration system Cost effective, low maintenance water intake system with best spraying system to make required dough consistency. 4. Batch discharge system Efficient system of discharging and processing dough once it leaves the mixer. 5. Prefer to purchase a US-made mixer. The key to success for the Pasta Shoppe product application involved our learning the pasta dough making process. We first had to understand how the semolina flour absorbs water, learn about its granulometry and discover how to provide sufficient hydration during the dough making process even before we set out to design the equipment, commented Evans. To accomplish this, our team did some lab testing to better understand how our equipment would complement the science of dough making, added Evans.

Solution
Adjustable paddles Changing the paddle position was not a tough job for Pasta Shoppe. Adjustment is often needed to get the product flow to look right and to achieve the best pitch for trough wall scraping. Specially designed clean up tools can be fabricated if necessary. The Lowe team invested in a considerable amount of research to determine the number of paddle blades, movement configuration and pitch and trough wall clearance positioning to meet Pasta Shoppes product requirements.
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Our solution involved a custom push-pull mixing design that allowed the product to be pulled across the trough for thorough mixing and hydration. Dough Hydration After considering various water intake pumping systems, the system chosen for Pasta Shoppe involved a metered intake from their municipal water line at the plant. Testing of the liquid addition system provided a successful solution for Pasta Shoppe as well. A pair of floodjet nozzles were positioned at just the right distance from the product level with the spray pattern shooting downward into the product on the upsweep side (high product level side). By careful placement of the nozzles the pattern width of 46 to 47 was accomplished for thorough product hydration of a 400 lb. batch. The addition rate can be regulated from the intake line to modulate the spray allowing for adjustments to the system. Batch Discharge System One goal of Pasta Shoppe was to get the batch mixing time from 25 minutes to 20 minutes and thoroughly discharged with incorporating other processing features to achieve a more lean processing system. One of the benefits of a Lowe Industries mixing system are the many features that can be custom-manufactured to support a lean process. Some of those features that were designed for Pasta Shoppe included: Pneumatically actuated contour slide discharge valve with bottom center discharge positioned to accommodate a stainless steel pallet for support of a product tote. Structural Legs Bolted structural angle iron legs with 15 clearance between discharge outlet and stainless steel pallet. Electrical Controls Including NEMA 4 (wash down) enclosure, suitable for 240 V, 3 Phase primary voltage, low voltage control circuit, 10 HP motor starter, push button start/stop/emergency, panel-mounted amp meter, push button discharge open/close (closes discharge after cleaning) and pre-wired at plant. Custom Safety-Grate & Cover to allow easy-dry ingredient addition and minimize dusting. Both the grate and cover were hinged to allow for quick cleaning between batches.

Benefits
Our innovative agitator designs enable shorter mix times, higher productivity and lower maintenance costs states Jeff Evans. Another benefit of our pasta dough mixer is that it is US-engineered, sold and service. Domestically this eliminates the shipping, currency and communication barriers of the Italian-made machines adds Evans.

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About Lowe Industries

Lowe Industries, located in Marion Iowa custom designs and manufacturers mixing and blending equipment for industries such as food, spice, dairy, pharmaceutical, pigment and plastic where sanitation is of primary concern. Our product designs lead the industry with efficient mixing performance, sanitary appearance, precision fabrication, thorough clean-out between batches and minimal long-term maintenance. Our mixers and blenders are available in both ribbon and paddle-style agitators. We also offer a free 21 day trial mixer to gather performance and process data during the initial stages of a project and provide our unique performance guarantee to prospective customers. Lowe Industries, 3575 3rd Avenue, Marion, IA 52302, US, Sales: 319-447-9724 www.lowemixers.com or contact Jeff Evans at evansj@marionmixers.com .

About Pasta Shoppe

Pasta Shoppe manufactures pasta, cookies and wholesale pasta and rice. They offer the worlds largest selection of fun pasta shapes and create custom logos and shapes for other companies to use as promotional items. Other product lines include Fun Meals Fast
easy pasta salads and meals ready in 15 minutes and Designer Sugar Cookies.

The Pasta Shoppe, P.O. Box 159245, Nashville, TN 37215, 1-800-247-0188 fax # 615-781-9335, http://www.pastashoppe.com/ or contact: Questions or comments: contactus@pastashoppe.com Fundraising Inquiries: fundraising@pastashoppe.com Wholesale Inquiries: wholesale@pastashoppe.com