Feature photo: Beldos
For a lot of food businesses, manual filling is just part of the routine.
But whether you’re filling gelato into takeaway cups, injecting jam into donuts, or portioning nut spread into jars … at some point, doing it by hand becomes a bottleneck that hurts your business.This guide covers the capability of depositors filling, dosing & injecting machines and which options we recommend for different types of businesses.
Quick Summary
- Depositors (sometimes known as depositing, dosing, or injecting machines) automate the process of portioning food product into containers, moulds, or putting fillings into food items.
- Benefits of depositors include time and labour savings, and scalability.
- The right machine depends on your product, batch size, and application. Artisan Industrial can guide you to the right machine.
Filling, depositing, injecting … what’s the difference?
Filling or depositing is the broad term for distributing liquid, semi-liquid, or paste food products (anything from cream or jam to soup or minced meat) into a container, cup, or mould.
Injecting means delivering product inside another food item. Things like filling a donut with jam, a croissant with cream, or a pastry with custard. The nozzle goes into the product rather than into a container.
Often, machines will only do one of the two: deposit or inject. Keep reading to find machines that do both.
So, what exactly is a depositor?
A depositor is equipment that doses portions of food or non-food products into a container or mould, etc. Rather than scooping, pouring, or piping by hand, the machine doses an amount every time.
They’re used across a huge range of food businesses. You’ll see them in gelato shops filling takeaway tubs, in bakeries portioning jam into jars, and at manufacturers filling cups at speed.
If filling or injecting your food items by hand is slowing your workflow down, it’s time to look into a depositor.
Why use a depositor?
Speed
A machine will outpace manual filling every time. What takes one person an hour can be done in a fraction of the time. Plus, it frees you up to work on other things.
Consistency
When you fill by hand, portion size can vary wildly. A machine doses a similar amount every time, which means less waste, more predictable yield, and a more professional result for your customer.
Scalability
A depositor is often the first step toward a bigger, more structured production process. This might mean upgrading from the slow process of hand-filling, or expanding an already automated process.
What to look for when choosing a depositor
A few things to consider:
What are you filling, and what are you filling it into?
Thin liquids, thick pastes, and chunky mixes all behave differently. So do cups, jars, moulds, and pastries. Make sure the machine can handle your specific product and application.
How much do you produce?
Hopper size and dosing speed vary significantly between machines. There’s no point in a 60L hopper if you’re making 10L batches, and no point in a 3L hopper if you’re producing at scale.
Does your product have pieces in it?
Inclusions like fruit, nuts, or granules need gears and nozzles sized to handle them without blockages.
Electric or pneumatic?
Electric depositors work well for most products. Pneumatic (compressed air) operation gives you a drip-free finish for more liquid products.
How often are you switching between different products?
If you’re switching between product types regularly, easy cleaning and recipe memory will save you a lot of time. Plus, some depositors cater for specific products, while others can accommodate a wide range of different products.
But you don’t have to figure all of this out yourself. If you get in touch with Artisan Industrial, we’ll ask you all the right questions and find you the right machine.
Which depositor is best for your business?
For businesses that need an all-in-one filling and injecting machine, Beldos depositors will be the most versatile tool in your toolbox.
Beldos depositors aren’t just for dosing nut spreads and sauces into containers and jars; they’re just as good for injecting creams and liquids into pastries, layering, and decorating your food products.
They can work with liquids, thick pastes, and mixes with chunks or inclusions, including:
- Fruit fillings and creams
- Jams and jellies
- Spreads and sauces
- Mousse and ice cream
- Yoghurt
- Soup
- Minced meat
- Mashed potatoes
- Cosmetic products (face cream, gel, shampoo, etc.)
- + much more
Compact depositors
For small to mid-sized producers, the Beldos compact range is a more affordable, space-efficient starting point.
The Mini-fill is the most accessible of the range. It’s a tabletop machine capable of up to 50 deposits per minute, with hopper sizes from 3L to 15L and storage for up to 100 recipes. dosing).
The Beltop and Beltop UNO depositors step up from there, offering greater flexibility for producers who need a little more output without moving to a full industrial setup.
Industrial depositors
For higher-volume production, the Beldos industrial range ramps things up.
Hoppers range from 18L to 60L, and the machines are built to integrate into your existing production line.
Alongside regular depositing options, there are multi-nozzle models that deposit up to 80 doses per nozzle per minute, filling an entire muffin tray or cake pan with one pass. Other models dose directly from a mixing bowl, or combine depositing and weighing in one step.
Whatever filling or injecting solution you need, Beldos has a machine that will cover it.
Check out our range of Beldos depositors.
Ready to speed up your filling process?
If hand-filling is slowing you down, we’d love to talk you through which depositor would work best for your production. Get in touch with the team at Artisan Industrial. We’ll point you in the right direction.
