Ketchup

Ketchup is the benchmark viscous food product: pulpy, acidic and expected in razor-thin portion costs. Its rheology sits between a paste and a liquid — it holds shape at rest and thins under shear, so the batch entering the hopper does not behave the same way once it has been worked through the dosing path. The pulp fraction carries tomato skin and fibre that must travel the whole dosing line without separating from the liquid phase or bridging in the nozzle. Acidity works against every contact part it touches, and inside the pack it has to be held by acid-resistant films that protect flavour. With one portion worth a fraction of a cent, overfill and rejects are judged against volumes in the hundreds of millions. Ketchup is dosed by high-speed piston filling with shut-off nozzles. A cylinder draws a measured volume from the hopper and displaces it through the nozzle, so the dose is fixed mechanically by stroke length rather than by how freely the sauce runs; batch-to-batch shifts in viscosity and pulp load then move the filled weight far less. The shut-off nozzle closes as the stroke ends and cuts the tail, which keeps the seal area clean at food-service volumes — product caught in the seal is the usual source of leakers. Piston bore, stroke and nozzle opening are matched to pulp size, and contact parts and seals are specified for acid resistance and for CIP between runs. As a ketchup stick pack the portion is a single serve for quick service restaurants, catering trays and hotel breakfast: narrow film, low cost per portion, torn open in one movement. As a sachet, sealed on three or four sides, the portion grows for delivery orders and condiment kits and the flat face carries print. In VFFS pillow bags ketchup moves in bulk to kitchens and industrial users who empty the pack into a dispenser. Dose range is 5-50 g, from single-serve sticks to catering portions. Output on a ketchup sachet packaging machine is multi-lane, and lane count follows pack width: an MSM1200 reaches up to 960 packs per minute on a narrow pack with 12 lanes, and the same machine gives up to 480 packs per minute at 6 lanes once the pack widens. Packs per minute is the cycle rate multiplied by lanes, not the cycle rate itself. Ketchup filling machine options cover ARTISTICK with 1-5 lanes, ISM400 with 2-5, ISM600 with 3-7, MSM800 with 4-10, MSM1200 with 6-12, SPM320 with 1-8, SPM800 with 4-12 and SPM1200 with 7-12. TM-2601 also runs this product. Lane count is chosen from the pack width and the target output. Typical buyers of a ketchup packaging machine are tomato processors and sauce producers, food-service and catering suppliers, co-packers serving restaurant chains, and private label producers filling condiments for retail and delivery.