Food Industry Safety Curtain
Product line SLC/SLG 440 IP69K: Hygienic and extremely robust
The Schmersal Group has developed a new product line for safety light grids and curtains eminently suitable for use in hygiene-sensitive sectors, such as the food industry, pharmaceuticals and meat and milk processing.
The new product line SLC/SLG 440 IP69K is resistant to all daily cleaning processes prevalent in such industries. Thanks to a sophisticated, detailed design, this product line achieves the protection rating IP69K and is thus protected against ingress of water during close-range high-pressure and high-temperature spray downs. This means that the seals on this active opto-electronic protective device (AOPD) meets very strict requirements and are able to withstand frequent cleaning with water, alkali solutions, foam, hot steam or high-pressure jets. The new AOPD product line has also been created based on the principles of hygienic design.
The SLC/SLG 440 IP69K locking caps are manufactured in stainless steel (V4A) as are the cable inlet and the fastening parts. Made of polycarbonate (PC), the transparent protective tubes not only offer high resistance to cleaning agents, but also withstand strong mechanical loads. If spray lances should accidentally strike the SLC/SLG 440 IP69K’s enclosure during pressure washing in food production or a transport should collide with the enclosure, the safety and protection function will continue to work thanks to the robust protective tubes.
The material thus guarantees greater availability and a long service life for safety light curtains and grids, also allowing a compact design for encapsulated safety sensors since the protective tubes are a mere 50 mm in diameter. The independent testing laboratory Ecolab has also verified the high resistance in these components’ materials.
Other characteristics in the AOPD product line include additional functions such as double confirmation, contactor control and integrated beam blanking, which allows moving parts to be conveyed through the protection field without triggering the stop signal. Yet another practical function is the dirt indicator. A visual warning message is displayed if the sensor reception signal becomes weaker. This allows the user to take action before the machine comes to an unscheduled standstill.
