Kiowa and Volac Hose Management Programme - Installing Roman Seliger Hose Loading Arms

In the summer of 2014 Kiowa was contacted by Elgan Jones from Volac Felinfach to discuss the development of a hose management programme for their rubber food transfer hoses used on their whey unloading area.

They were experiencing a number of areas of concern with the current tanker offload area at this depot:-

Hoses were trailing over the tanker offload area which potentially could be trip hazardsto tanker operators.

Operators were finding it increasing difficult with the continual lifting and handling ofthe heavy rubber hoses.

The hose assemblies were quite often being damaged and having to be replaced frombeing dropped or being run over by tankers. Also raising the risk of milk spillage in thisarea.

Kiowa’s National Account Manager for Hoses; Mark Broad and National Account Manager for Couplings; James Davies visited Volac to discuss their concerns and after discussions between both parties decided that the best option was to install and trial the Roman Seliger SGA Hose Loading Arm.

The SGA hose loading arm is used throughout Europe for arduous chemical applications but Volac were the first dairy to our knowledge in the UK to buy into this concept for a dairy tanker offloading area.

Roman Seliger in Germany have a department dedicated to designing and specifying SGA loading arms and once a simple questionnaire had been completed by Volac and further technical discussions with Kiowa an outline drawing was produced and an order was placed by Volac for 5 hose loading arms. It was decided that the SGA support pillar would be installed at 45º so when the loading arms were not in use they could be pulled back horizontally and act as a walk way for Volac site personnel.

It was recommended that Volac used a 3” rubber food transfer hose for whey unloading under vacuum with the SGA loading arms. Trelleborg Citerdial was selected by Volac as the hose is light and flexible and meets the most stringent requirements meeting EU regulations n° 1935/2004 and 2023/2006 and FDA regulation 21 CFR 177.2600.

The SGA hose loading arms were also fitted with ABV unvalved breakaway couplings as in the event of a tanker pulling away, the pins in the ABV coupling will shear protecting the loading arm and preventing any damage to the tanker. The hoses were assembled, and also fitted with RJT female couplings for connecting to the tanker and also tested and certified at Kiowa’s head office in Sleaford.

Since the installation in January 2015 Volac operators and third party milk tanker drivers have tried the new system and have found that it really has taken the strain off lifting hoses as they now only lift the last 1m of the Citerdial hose. The SGA loading arm has greatly reduced the instances of the hoses being dropped or crushed by tankers resulting in the rubber hoses lasting over 12 months in service without having to be replaced.

Please contact Kiowa's Sleaford sales office on 01529 416200 to organise a site visit from one of our National Account Managers, we may be able to help make your offloading area safer and create savings for your business.