Specialized Multihead Weigher for Long-Strip Pet Food: The Anti-Blocking Solution for Jerky, Chew Sticks & Dental Sticks

If you manufacture pet treats — jerky strips, chew sticks, dental bones, or any long-strip product — you already know the problem. Your multihead weigher works fine with granules and pellets. But the moment you switch to long-strip materials, everything changes: product bridges at the discharge port, clogs in the collecting chute, weighing accuracy drops, and your line grinds to a halt.

This isn't a maintenance issue. It's a design issue. Standard multihead weighers are engineered for free-flowing granular products, not for irregularly shaped long strips that interlock, tangle, and jam.

At TOUPACK, we engineered a specialized combination weigher for long-strip materials — not adapted from a standard model, but designed from the ground up to solve the three problems that plague every long-strip pet food packaging line: blockages, weighing deviation, and feed inconsistency.

Why Long-Strip Pet Food Breaks Standard Multihead Weighers

Long-strip pet treats — beef jerky strips, chicken jerky, chew sticks, dental sticks, rawhide rolls — share physical characteristics that make them fundamentally incompatible with standard weighing equipment:

• High length-to-width ratio — strips are typically 30–120mm long, causing them to interlock and form arches (bridging) at narrow discharge openings
• Irregular shape — unlike granules, each strip has a unique geometry, making consistent feeding difficult
• Sticky surface — meat-based treats often have residual oils or moisture, increasing adhesion to hopper walls
• Variable bulk density — the same volume can contain significantly different weights depending on how strips orient themselves

When these characteristics meet a standard combination weigher designed for granular products, the result is predictable: frequent stoppages, inaccurate weights, product waste, and reduced line efficiency.

The TOUPACK Solution: Engineered for Long Strips, Not Adapted

1. Specialized Linear Vibratory Feeders with V-Shaped or Flat-Bottom Troughs

The first point of failure in long-strip weighing is the feeding stage. Standard trough designs allow strips to pile up chaotically, entering the weighing buckets in tangled masses rather than orderly streams.

Our Multihead weigher feeders are optionally equipped with:

• V-shaped troughs — channel long strips into a single-file orientation, preventing tangling before material reaches the weighing bucket
• Flat-bottom troughs with flow-dividing bosses — divide the material stream evenly across the trough width, ensuring balanced distribution to all heads

Each trough geometry is selected based on your specific product's length-to-width ratio. The result: orderly, single-file feeding that directly translates to weighing accuracy.

2. 70° Angled Collecting Chute with Partitioned Structure

After weighing, material must flow from the collecting chute into the discharge position. Standard chutes — typically designed for granular flow — are too steep or too narrow for long strips, causing product to stick, bridge, and accumulate.

Our collecting chute features a 70° angled design with partitioned structure. This angle is not arbitrary — it's the result of extensive testing with various long-strip products to find the optimal slide angle that balances gravity-assisted flow with controlled descent. The partitioned structure guides each portion of material independently, preventing cross-interference between heads.

The result: long-strip material slides smoothly into the discharge position — no sticking, no bridging, no accumulated product that throws off the next cycle.

3. Multi-Discharge Hopper: The Anti-Breakthrough Innovation

This is the core innovation that sets our pet food weigher apart from every standard model on the market.

Traditional multihead weighers discharge all material in a single dump. For granular products, this works fine. But for long strips, the moment all material drops simultaneously, strips interlock mid-air and form a bridge at the discharge port — exactly when the system needs to be at its fastest.

Our "multi-discharge hopper" function solves this at the mechanical level. Instead of a single dump, the system releases material in multiple controlled stages. This staged discharge:

• Prevents strips from interlocking during discharge
• Eliminates bridging and clogging at the discharge port
• Reduces impact force on downstream packaging equipment
• Maintains continuous flow without manual intervention

The bottom line: your line keeps running, cycle after cycle, with zero clog-related stoppages.

4. Interchangeable Hopper Volumes for Maximum Flexibility

Pet food manufacturers rarely produce a single product. Today it's mini training treats; tomorrow it's premium dental sticks. Each product has different dimensions, different bulk density, and different target weights.

Our multihead weigher accommodates interchangeable hopper volumes — 1.6L and 2.5L as standard, with custom options available. Switching between product lines doesn't require new equipment — just swap hoppers and adjust parameters on the touchscreen.

This flexibility means one weigher can serve your entire long-strip product range, maximizing equipment ROI and minimizing floor space requirements.

Technical Specifications

Applications: What Products Can This Weigher Handle?

The TOUPACK long-strip specialized combination weigher is designed for any pet food product with a high length-to-width ratio, including but not limited to:

• Beef jerky strips — the most common long-strip pet treat, notorious for clogging standard weighers
• Chicken jerky — irregular shapes and sticky surfaces
• Chew sticks / rawhide rolls — dense, rigid, and prone to bridging
• Dental sticks — uniform shape but high length-to-width ratio
• Training treats (mini strips) — small but still elongated
• Freeze-dried meat strips — lightweight and fragile, requiring gentle handling
• Pet food bars / biscuits — rigid rectangular shapes

Beyond pet food, the same engineering principles apply to any long-strip or irregular product: snack sticks, nutrition bars, biscuit sticks, and more.

Complete Pet Food Weighing & Packaging Line

The multihead weigher is the heart of your packaging line — but it's not the whole system. TOUPACK provides a fully integrated pet food packaging line:

• Multihead combination weigher (long-strip specialized) — precision weighing at 40 BPM
• Vertical packaging machine — bag forming, filling, and sealing in a single operation
• Bucket elevator / Z-belt conveyor — product feeding from upstream processing
• Finished product conveyor — transport sealed bags to inspection and cartoning
• Check weigher / metal detector — quality assurance and compliance

All equipment is designed and manufactured by TOUPACK, ensuring seamless integration, single-source responsibility, and consistent after-sales support.

Why Choose TOUPACK?

• 16+ years of specialization — founded in 2009, focused exclusively on intelligent weighing and packaging equipment
• 100+ patents — proprietary technology across combination weighers, linear weighers, and packaging machines
• 1,000+ customers worldwide — proven across pet food, snack food, frozen food, and more
• CE & ISO9001 certified — meets European and international quality standards
• IP65 / IP67 rated — full wash-down capability for food-grade environments
• 30,000+ m² manufacturing facility — vertically integrated production, not assembled from third-party components
• OEM/ODM available — customize hopper volumes, head counts, and control systems to your requirements

Frequently Asked Questions