Freeze Dryers

Freeze drying retains the natural color, taste and nutritional value of pet foods, while creating a premium lightweight product that is shelf-stable at room temperature, easy to pack and transport and convenient for retailers and consumers.

By drying frozen products under vacuum, ice can be removed as a vapor, by sublimation, without passing through the intermediate liquid stage. This preserves the overall structure and size of the original product, including its vitamins, proteins, flavors and colors. GEA can provide the technology for freeze drying raw pet foods allowing them to keep their original properties, texture and uncooked appearance and avoiding exposure to temperatures above 40°C.

Freeze drying technology

GEA has over 50 years of experience and process knowledge in freeze drying technology. GEA expertise will help you to optimize your processes, improve productivity, enhance product quality, reduce product losses, minimize environmental impact and create complete freeze-drying lines that are tailored to your specific needs. 

GEA freeze dryers for pet food

GEA’s RAY® freeze dryer enables a highly efficient and economical batch freeze drying process for meat products and mixes with a typical drying time of less than 12 hours. The RAY® dryers provide negligible product loss and have low energy consumption, uniform drying, high sublimation capacities and a modular design. Small RAY (size up to 50) cabinets can be de-iced in just 30 minutes whereas larger units (RAY 75 -150) benefit from GEA’s Continuous De-Icing System (CDI) to further reduce energy consumption and the changeover time between batches to less than 30 minutes. Working with GEA freeze drying technology has the following advantages:

• Short drying times
• Reliable and easy to use plant
• Minimized energy costs
• Pilot plant available for small-scale production, testing and product development

GEA Pilot Plant and test facilities

GEA provides the opportunity for customers to test processes and develop new products on the RAY® Pilot Plant at its test center in Copenhagen and draw on GEA’s know-how from decades of working with freeze drying technology. Here customers can optimize processes and develop new products ahead of commercial-scale production. The freeze dryer is also suitable for pilot production, providing accurate data that can be used to seamlessly scale up production to an industrial level.   

Tailored solutions for freeze dried pet food

GEA scope of supply includes processing solutions for a variety of freeze dried pet food products such as:

• Raw meat
• Cooked meat
• Kibbles
• Pet food treats

Complete lines

GEA technology covers every step of pet food production to provide complete lines including: pre-breaking, grinding, analyzing, mixing, batching, emulsifying, pumping, material handling, forming, cooking, cooling, chilling, freezing, freeze drying and packaging. Advanced control software maintains the essential reliability and repeatability of the whole process.