spiral freezer - nitrogen freezer - freezing tunnel – cooling – IQF - tunnel freezer - plate freezer

IQF freezing and cooling tunnels

Continuous freezers and cooling tunnels are used to freeze or cool large quantities of meat, poultry, fish, vegetables, fruit, bakery, pasta and specially prepared food. There are different models, such as spiral freezers, tunnel freezers, plate freezers, screw freezers, cooling tunnels, cooling belts with multiple tiers and more.
IQF (individually quick frozen) is a freezing application which makes sure that the frozen products do not get stuck together.

These cooling and freezing tunnels are designed to minimize product weight loss and to assure gentle handling of the product during the freezing process.

The food products are transported on a stainless conveyor belt through an insulated tunnel. The belt speed and the injections of liquid gas can be regulated. These injections are automatically controlled via the tunnel temperature for the optimization of the gas consumption. The liquid gas will absorb heat from the products and is converted into cold gas containing atmosphere in the tunnel.

Plate freezers are used to freeze flat products, such as pastries, fish fillets and beef patties, as well as irregular-shaped vegetables which are packaged in brick-shaped containers, such as asparagus, cauliflower, spinach and broccoli. The food is firmly pressed between metal plates which are cooled to subfreezing temperatures by internally circulating refrigerants.