Jar Filling Machines

[WoodenBeam]

Considering taking the plunge and investing in a jar filling unit plus table such as the Swienty Dana Api Matic with turntable.

A query to those who may have this unit - is the 70cm turntable large enough or better to go with the 100cm turntable?

Fillers are now available from a number of manufacturers/distributors - Abelo, Logar, Nassenheider via Carl Fritz, Thomas Apiculture and I notice Lega also now stock a variety of units.

Does anyone have experience of these & any recommendations/positive/negative comments?

Thanks in anticipation

 

[Jimmy]

No direct experience, might be worth searching for Laurence Edwards of Black Mountain Honey on youtube/Twitter as he bought a Lyson one last year and I'm fairly sure he posted about it. Possibly not one of his longer reviews though.

https://twitter.com/BlackMountHoney/status/1170607791641415680?s=19

 

[foghornleghorn]

Have the older lyson one with the impeller pump. The newer model has a gear pump and I presume drips less. I have the bigger turntable and wouldn't want it to be any smaller

 

[Millet]

Here is my jar filling machine minus he ripped muscled arm..

https://www.nisbets.co.uk/arcoroc-g..._63901012986_321523756681_pla-854179951168_c_

 

[ladaok]

Give us an idea on number of jars to fill or required hr / day

 

[yeogi75]

Dont just look on beekeeping sale sites look on the net for viscose filling machines you will find plenty

 

[Millet]

Give us an idea on number of jars to fill or required hr / day

Lot's and lot's..

 

[Hedgerow Honey]

We have had a swienty 1000 unit for a number of years.

I purchased second hand through the BFA & paid a third of new price, it had only filled 470 jars in its life.

the machine has performed faultlessly for three years now, the only fault has been the failure of a small plastic part that fits between the gears of the motor and filling head, it didn't stop the machine working as I glued it back together till a new part arrived.
swienty were excellent in their customer service as the part only took two days to arrive from Denmark.

I also use as a pump for filling barrels out of a api-melter which has been fitted with screens similar to a sump.

I soon did away with the turntable as with fine setting of the filing rate I can fill & lid quicker without it, easy 300 1lb jars in an hour, jarred, lidded, labelled and reboxed, probably quicker with just lidding but I don't like having the jars open on turntable because of potential spillage & contamination.
The farmers I know with small filling machines generally go for a swienty or nassen machine.

 

[nantmoel]

I've just bought the Swienty Table Top Filling Station, I went for this because of its size, it holds 13 jars at a time but as fast as you can add more jars it fills them, its an amazing piece of equipment.

 

[BMH]

...

 

[ericbeaumont]

Fillers are now available from a number of manufacturers/distributors - Abelo, Logar, Nassenheider via Carl Fritz, Thomas Apiculture and I notice Lega also now stock a variety of units.

Can only add that I looked closely at Logar extractors at Tradex last year and thought the quality of construction was very good. Carl Fritz were there as well, but supply (rather than make their own) Swienty and Nassenheider bottling turntables.

Abelo is £2.7k, Swienty £2.5k from Thorne. To find Nassenheider prices you have to register, and email Logar; Lega look expensive at £3.7. I'd be interested to find out how prices and quality compare, as I'm heading in the same direction.

 

[Beefriendly]

Quick question for those who already have an automatic bottler...., how are they at dispensing and pulling through freshly creamed honey straight from a creaming machine?
I understood that the honey tank usually needs to be above the level of the pump for really accurate dispensing....is this correct, or thoughts.

 

[nantmoel]

Quick question for those who already have an automatic bottler...., how are they at dispensing and pulling through freshly creamed honey straight from a creaming machine?
I understood that the honey tank usually needs to be above the level of the pump for really accurate dispensing....is this correct, or thoughts.

I have the Swienty machine and you can get a non return valve for the input side, then the tank can be below. Creamed honey straight from the creamer is fine, its normally warm.

 

[WoodenBeam]

Quick question for those who already have an automatic bottler...., how are they at dispensing and pulling through freshly creamed honey straight from a creaming machine?
I understood that the honey tank usually needs to be above the level of the pump for really accurate dispensing....is this correct, or thoughts.

Planning on a small pallet style lifter to assist with moving/lifting of tanks, then connecting via 'Banjo' irrigation style couplings.
Someone else I know has adapted something along the lines of a 'Stanner Stair Lift'

 

[Beefriendly]

Planning on a small pallet style lifter to assist with moving/lifting of tanks, then connecting via 'Banjo' irrigation style couplings.
Someone else I know has adapted something along the lines of a 'Stanner Stair Lift'

Thanks Nant and Wooden. Been looking at scissor lifts but to get required height is not cheap .....was considering melting/creaming on upstairs landing and long tube....

 

[Jimmy]

Thanks Nant and Wooden. Been looking at scissor lifts but to get required height is not cheap .....was considering melting/creaming on upstairs landing and long tube....

Can your hive lifter be of use?

 

[nantmoel]

Thanks Nant and Wooden. Been looking at scissor lifts but to get required height is not cheap .....was considering melting/creaming on upstairs landing and long tube....

No need with the non return valve - £35 extra, I've now ordered one, what I found if you keep running the filling it didn't need it, but when you stopped it to go and get more boxes of jars the honey run back slightly into the tank.

 

[yeogi75]

after nearly 30 years filling viscose liquid, i would advise the bottom of tank be 2" above the filling head, as when the tank is full it will give out correct weights, but when lower in the pot it struggles to maintain proper weight, mostly because it has self feeding down the line also if vacume delivery as pot emptys there will be some back suction which varies the weight

 

[BMH]

No direct experience, might be worth searching for Laurence Edwards of Black Mountain Honey on youtube/Twitter as he bought a Lyson one last year and I'm fairly sure he posted about it. Possibly not one of his longer reviews though.

https://twitter.com/BlackMountHoney/status/1170607791641415680?s=19

Yes - I have the Lyson impeller style filling machine. Its a fantastic machine but does have its flaws.

1. The impeller very occasionly drips. Especially if not dispensing. Its a minor issue.

2. The mechanism to get the jars into the correct position is very finely tuned. Takes a bit of trial and error and it the beginning to get it working, but once calibrated it works well.

I connect to a either the 100ltr settling tank or 100 ltr heated creamer, that both have ball valves attached. Tend to run 100 litre of creamed out the creamer and 100 litres of runny out of the settling tank in a single sitting. Thats circa 1000 jars.

Takes me a couple of hours.

I don't know how people do it without the turntable. I tried once and was averaging 100 per hour. I do 600 per hour with the turntable (not including labels though).

I have no issues with the smaller turntable. I cant get anywhere near feeding it quick enough as a single operator. If there were two of us then I would go for the bigger one but for me it came down to space constraints.

The machine also works well as a creaming machine if you pump and cycle out of the same container but I stick to my creamer for that.

I will be doing a video review on my youtube channel over the next couple of weeks so stay tuned.

My view is that its not perfect but a good, solid time saving machine.

I have no experience with any other brands.

 

[Beefriendly]

Can your hive lifter be of use?

It's only rated to about 100kgs and would need tanks to be hive shaped.
Gentlemen thanks for all the thoughts....I'm working on it....
Currently best speed byu hand is only 60 jars/hr (includes washing and labelling). I need to get faster, spend more time selling and less time bottling