Fruit arriving at the production plant may come from various sources. During harvest bins arrive at the production plant directly from the orchard. After harvest is finished, bins arrive at the production plant from our cold storage locations. Once the cold storage supplies for a particular variety are exhausted, controlled atmosphere (CA) rooms must be opened to supply the production line.

The Pregrade Line can grade and size approximately 500 bins in one eight hour shift. That's 400,000 pounds or 182,000 Kg! In one week only one daily shift can grade and size 2,000,000 pounds! When market demand is strong, a night shift is utilized to further increase throughput.

Five hundred bins a day requires substantial storage space. Several storage rooms are located at the Summerland plant. However, to supply the continuing operation of this Pregrade Line from other storage locations, several large trucks must be dedicated to transporting fruit. Here is a picture of a large capacity truck.

Loosening Tie-Down Straps

Large Capacity Truck

Fruit stored at other locations require approximately three days of dedicated trucking before the Pregrade Line can begin operating. This allows time to schedule a production crew, allocate temporary bin storage space, and determine what changes are required for the Pregrade Line computer programs.

Very few people are required to operate the Pregrade Line. The crew primarily consists of forklift drivers at both ends of the line and people who supervise the automated equipment. Here is a picture of a forklift driver loading the line and a picture of the automatic bin feeder.

Forklift Loading Pregrade Line

Automatic Bin Feeder

The bins are submerged under water and the apples float. That is how we gently remove the apples from the bin. Water is also used to move the apples to the sorting table.

Bins Submerge, Apples Float

Water Flows To Sorting Table

A small elevator removes the apples from the water. Rollers on the sorting table automatically turn the apples as they pass by trained sorters. On the Pregrade Line, a sorting crew is only required if the growers' fruit has substantial defects. Defect sorting is currently still done manually whereas grading and sizing is accomplished by the computer controlled equipment.

Pregrade Sorting Tables

After defect sorting, the apples return to the water to be transported to the grading and sizing equipment. Here are pictures of apples in water transport and apples riding the elevator into the grading and sizing equipment.

Water Flows To Grader

Elevator From Water Into Grader

This grader is built by MAF in France. It has 10 lanes.

Color cameras are focused on each lane. The cameras measure the color surface area as well as the color density. Higher grade apples have relatively more surface area colored as well as slightly darker color.

With this equipment apple size can be determined by weight or by measuring diameter. Currently, size is determined by weight.

The Grader At Work

The computer memorizes the grade and size of each apple as it travels along the grader. Apples of similar grade and size are released into the same area. A soft green brush catches the apples as they are released on a short belt. This belt releases the apples into a water flume. Here is a photograph of the grader releasing apples onto the white belt which are then transferred to a water flume.. Can you see the soft green brushes in the grader?

The Grader Releases Apples

Flumes are a collection area for similar grade and size fruit. Limited flumes are available. Therefore, the computer program executing on the Pregrade Line must reflect the variety of fruit, the grades desired, the sizes desired, the market demand for the variety and the current apple crop size and quality.

For a variety with many grades, Red Delicious for example, some grades may require a second pass through the Pregrade Line in order to extract all the desired grades and sizes.

Water Flume

Once a flume has accumulated sufficient apples, the Bin Filler Operator will feed an empty bin into the bin filler and, via a switchboard, send the apples to the bin filler. There are 5 bin fillers.

The bin fillers hydraulically push the bins underwater. Apples and water from the accumulator flume flow into the submerged bin. As apples and water enter the submerged bin, water is removed. The bin filler directs the apples from the flume into the submerged bin.

The bin filler has a viewing window. Here are pictures of the bin filler window and bins exiting the bin filler. Note the water still dripping from the bin.

Bin Filler Window

Bin Exiting The Bin Filler

Bin Exiting The Bin Filler

The Bin Filler Operator tags each bin with a colored paper indicating the variety, grade and size of apples in the bin. Forklift drivers move the filled bins from the bin filler to a floor collection area.

Floor Collection Area

Floor Collection Area

Similar size and similar color apples are now separated. Here is a sample of the various sizes.

Red Delicious Sizes

Forklift drivers will move four bins at a time to a climate controlled storage room. Here the bins will be kept until required for the Tray Line.

Temporary Storage

Temporary Storage

How about a tour of the Summerland Tray Line?