The RotoPilot was originally designed to aerate many different types of products, from foamy and highly aerated products like whipped cream, marshmallow and angel kiss to cake batters. Reproducible results that can be scaled up quickly to large-scale production equipment have made the system the R&D solution for many R&D departments at TFT customers around the world. RotoPilot has become the benchmark and a powerful tool with results directly linkable to full scale TFT production units.

Since continuous aeration techno-logy is only one part of the TFT portfolio, the market demanded an even more flexible R&D platform. The new RotoPilotPlant needed to have the same heating, chilling and crystallizing capabilities as large-scale production lines. To make this possible, TFT started developing a laboratory scale scraped surface heat exchanger (SSHE). With this addition to the existing RotoPilot, the R&D machine has become even more versatile.

One of the biggest benefits of the additional SSHE is its capability of continuous crystallizing and aerating of all types of cream type fillings for sandwich biscuits, wafers and many more products. The capability to cool a cream, sugar syrup or aerated foam in-line for marshmallow production is a major benefit. This was the starting point for TFT to develop a versatile R&D platform combining aerator, SSHE, water tempering and colour/flavour or acid injection.

Fast results, minimal product waste and easy, reliable, scalable to production applications are key-words describing this unit’s functionality. The system is easy to configure upon the specific process requirements. For example, heat exchanger location before or after the aerator can be changed in a blink. For special executions and a wider range on mixing head revolutions, servo technology can be embedded in the control system. Also, data exchange with auxiliary equipment is a possible option.