Pet Food: reliable and gentle drying

Pet food and animal feed are delicate goods requiring optimum processing. Product integrity and safety have top priority in the drying process.

Our integrated heat pump system with its constant process parameters ensures reliable drying while low temperatures warrant gentle drying of your products. The closed system produces good results in terms of appearance, aroma and bioactivity.

The heat pump based condensation drying technology implemented in our Airgenex^®food dryer is the optimum answer to your drying needs.

On the following pages, you may find advantages of our pet food dryers, how they work and where they are applied.

Your Benefits

Low temperatures

Heat pump based condensation drying is capable of drying your products at temperatures variable between 20 °C and 75 °C. Using low temperatures is a gentle way of drying your pet food.

Reliable and Efficient

Airgenex^®food dryers ensure high efficiency of the drying process. We condition the air in a hi-tech process and pass it accurately over or through the product to be dried. This makes drying reliable stabilizing your workflow and optimizing your process. The heat pump helps to save a lot of energy and CO2 resulting in significantly lower cost compared with conventional systems.

Always the Suitable Drying Solution

Many years of experience in and know-how of many hundreds of drying applications ensure that you get the solutions exactly suiting your product and your production process. This is the only way to success for you, the customer, and us, the supplier.

Closed system

HARTER drying systems are basically closed – no interchange with ambient air and, thus, no dependence from the climate. This helps to achieve positive results in terms of bioactivity, aromas and appearance. Additives, for example, are not required. The dried products do not require any additional flavouring.

Temperature Equalization and Sterilization

Do you require sterilization to prevent moulding? In such cases, we add temperature equalization at 100 °C max.

Combining Drying and Cooling

Our dryers may be easily modified for additional cooling if desired or required by the process. Quite a few combined drying-cooling systems are already in operation. We will also be happy to elaborate energy efficiency concepts, for example to return waste energy from cooling into other processes in your company.

Drying Systems for Pet Food

We develop, design and manufacture drying systems both for batch and continuous operation. Our technology is modified to meet your specifications. All drying related parameters for your specific application are determined by prior tests in our test center.

For drying to be successful, a perfect match of air dehumidification and air routeing is required. Extremely dry, unsaturated air, at low temperatures, is routed exactly to the place where humidity is to be absorbed. This process – our heat pump based condensation drying – is applied in various types of system designs. Our drying systems for pet food and animal feed are made of stainless steel and can be cleaned in compliance with applicable food standards. We shall be pleased to meet your specific hygienic design requirements. Just contact us!

Is your application different from above?

You will certainly understand that we cannot possibly list all our drying solutions here. If your application is not covered above, please contact us. We shall be pleased to offer non-committal consultation!

Products

With our energy-saving drying systems, you can gently dry all types of pet food and animal feed.

Dry Pet Food

Drying takes place at a gentle temperature, normally between 35 °C and 65 °C, as desired or as is best for your product. Sterilization may, of course, be integrated in the drying process.

Chews

Such treats are normally dried with the items placed in single layer. Our dryers produce the specified exact residual humidity – from soft to crunchy. The response of your product – in terms of appearance, aroma, and ingredients – to our low temperature drying may be determined in trial tests which we will be pleased to run for you.

Insect Food / Entofood

Protein-rich insects as animal food are a sustainable alternative to conventional sources of protein. Entotarian food also requires good drying for further processing or preserving.

Gentle drying of nuts | HARTER drying solutions

Packaged Products

Drying of packages such as stand-up pouches requires an approach much different from that of drying pet food. The point here is to dry surface to become completely dry and free from any residues. Also, time is a very critical parameter for package drying. For more information about package drying click here.

Something else?

Do you have a product that differs from the examples given here? We are an innovative team and look forward to new tasks. Have your product tested in our Pilot Plant Station without obligation. Contact us – we will be happy to advise you without obligation!

The Process

Extremely dry process air at the right place: A nifty combination of air conditioning and air routeing ensures efficient and high quality drying results.

Where Drying becomes a Special Event

Our Test Center – where Ideas are forged

Our test center is unique.

A room full of technical equipment and opportunities.
A place full of ingenuity and innovation.
Engineering spirit meets creativity.
Clients with faces in wonder.

Please, come in!

Tests provide valuable Information and Confidence

Series of tests run in our test center provide valuable information and confidence. We test your product for response to temperature, time, humidity, air speed and airflow rate. We also look at the routeing of the air inside the dryer because this is a critical factor on the way to success. To do all this, we have several multifunctional dryers which our food engineer adapts to the specific application. Our service to you includes, of course, an evaluation and interpretation of, and a comprehensive report on the results of these tests.

Sometimes, the parameters for a successful solution are clear at hand after just one series of tests. Every now and then, several runs with varying configurations are required. This is the moment when it takes the knowledge and creativity of our food engineer to find a good solution. And we always find one.

We have run thousands of drying tests in our test center in more than 30 years. The experience gathered and the know-how obtained therefrom may not be valued high enough. And it is for your benefit.

A Day filled with more than just Engineering Matters

You are welcome to witness our tests. See with your very eyes how powerful our condensation drying is and how we create viable solutions. We will give you an insight into drying issues. It is equally important that your product and process expertise is duly reflected so that the joint project may be successful. We also cultivate hospitality and good company. So, your stay will be both pleasant and informative.

Our Special Service

It may appear reasonable to run drying tests at your premises using a system provided on loan. In such case, one of our qualified engineers will instruct you on how to run your own tests. We also build larger scale test set-ups as agreed.

You are a Manufacturer and want a better Dryer?

You already have a product and a process and wish to optimise your drying process? Maybe the energy consumption of your existing dryer is too high? Or you want to raise your throughput? A shorter drying time would be helpful? Or you just want to know the impact of our low temperatures on the aroma, appearance, haptics and ingredients of your product?

Our test center will provide answers to your questions. You tell us the ideal conditions under which your product should get dry. As an outcome of our tests, we will furnish a solution. The results are very often much better than expected by our customers. We can routinely stun our customers in terms of colour & aroma, time & temperature.

You have a new Product Idea?

You are planning to introduce an entirely new product and do not know exactly how to do the drying?

Whatever the challenge to be met we will be glad to deal with it. It is our passion to find the best drying solutions. When running tests, our food engineer quickly sees which parameters are best suited to ensure successful drying. If products are particularly demanding there is always an engineering trick to help us arrive at a solution.

You are a Research Enterprise or a University?

We have repeatedly taken on the drying part in several research projects that included the defined dehumidification of a product. We also regularly employ undergraduates who contribute to research projects by doing their own research and work. Universities have used our loan systems to run their own series of tests for various research purposes. Extensive mutual exchange is conducive to the advancement of both parties‘ endeavours.

Give things a trial with us. Get your inspiration from us. Explore new avenues, including mental ones. You might end up realizing an idea that you did not have in the first place …