In only two Steps: from Cocoa Nibs to Cocoa Mass

With the combination of beater blade mills and agitator bead mills, the Netzsch Confectionery Division has now strengthened its expertise in processing cocoa nibs into the finest cocoa mass. The company introduced the Tango compact cocoa system, which does the job with only one agitator bead mill, to the public for the first time at the Interpack 2014.

The newly-developed skid system is one of the first outcomes of the alliance between Netzsch Confectionery and the Hamburg machine-building company Dr.-Ing. Bauermeister GmbH. Essentially, Tango is made up of two mills: an LME Series agitator bead mill and an N Series beater blade mill.

"Both mills, along with a feed pump and control unit, are mounted on a tubular frame, thereby forming a coherent unit. It requires minimal space and is easy to transport and install," stated Theron Harbs, General Manager of Netzsch Confectionery, describing the design. The associated benefits with respect to efficiency, energy consumption and operating costs are obvious.

The compact processing system can do the job with only one agitator mill because the cocoa nibs first undergo a high level of comminution in the beater blade mill. It processes a granulate with a grain size of several millimeters into a mass with a particle size of less than 75 micrometers. The product is fed from the top and is also processed in this direction.

Preserves Flavor, no intermediate Tank, long Service Life

Because the drive system of the beater blade mill is on top, there is room to install an additional cooling system in the lower area of the tank. This allows the cocoa mass to be processed at temperatures that will preserve the flavor, thus eliminating the need for an intermediate tank. This way, up to four tons of the finest cocoa mass can be processed per hour.

The four beater blades deliver exceptional performance with high precision and a long service life and – when necessary – can be exchanged outside the tank within half an hour.