IMA Food Equipment (St Albans) says bakers increasingly need dividers that can handle “challenging” doughs, such as ciabatta, focaccia, Scottish rolls and gluten-free doughs.

The company supplies

equipment from Bertuetti Compact Systems of Brescia, Italy, which is regularly used to divide ciabatta and other types of doughs.

The company’s latest development is the SV200/300 – a universal divider for hard or soft dough, leavened or unleavened, plain or with inclusions such as olives and sun-dried tomatoes.

The dough is loaded onto an infeed belt (25-30kg), which leads to a variable thickness roller unit and then into a patented inlet feeder that controls the dough, stress free, into the cutting unit.

A linear cutter divides into one to seven (depending on size required) and through to a guillotine-type cutting unit. Electronic setting of the weight and speed are standard together with automatic correction of the valves in relation to thickness and desired weight.

The exit belt can be used for discharge onto baking trays with automatic tray loader, onto further moulding machines or simply to a table by hand.

The optional moulder can produce French sticks, long rolls and long loaves at a throughout of up to 3,500 per hour.