Give every flow a measurement boundary
Fresh-fruit intake includes material that will be removed during sorting and pulping. The evaporator receives the screened stream after those separations. The filler receives concentrated product after subsequent transfers and treatment. A flow measurement at one of these positions cannot be relabelled as another without a balance.
Use mass units when comparing material quantities. A volumetric flow requires density at the relevant temperature and composition before it can be compared with a mass flow. Batch size and container count add their own time basis: a large mixing tank does not establish continuous output.
| Quantity | Where it belongs | Useful basis |
|---|---|---|
| Fruit intake | Before sorting and preparation losses | Accepted or gross fruit mass per hour, explicitly identified |
| Screened feed | At evaporator or next-process inlet | Mass flow and representative concentration |
| Evaporation | Water removed from the defined feed | Water mass per hour at the stated inlet/outlet conditions |
| Packed output | Finished product in the chosen pack | Net product mass and packs per hour over an agreed period |
Use the calculator as an ideal comparison
The calculator below treats the entered feed and target readings as soluble-solids proxies and assumes that those solids are retained. On that ideal basis, concentrated output equals feed multiplied by the inlet-to-outlet concentration ratio; the difference is the calculated water removal.
For example, 5 t/h at 5 °Brix concentrated to 30 °Brix gives about 0.83 t/h of product and 4.17 t/h of removed water on the no-loss basis. This is a worked arithmetic example, not a tomato recovery result or a quoted machine duty. It excludes discarded fruit, skin, seeds, retained product and other processing losses.
Add the losses and measurement conditions back in
For an evaporator calculation, the most useful input is normally the actual screened stream entering that equipment. For whole-plant planning, sorting and pulper losses must first connect the received fruit to that stream. Measuring the amount and condition of each reject is more informative than inserting an assumed universal tomato yield.
A refractometer reading is not automatically total dry solids. Suspended tomato material and a formulated ketchup containing sugar, salt and other ingredients require their own interpretation. A recipe mass balance follows the measured ingredient additions and outputs; the fresh-tomato paste calculator is not a formulation calculator.
Size the operating day, not only a steady-state hour
The harvest intake profile, available processing hours, cleaning, startup and container changes determine the duty over a shift. A nominal steady-state rate does not account for all these periods. If fruit arrives faster than it can be processed, the reception and operating plan need to address that mismatch.
Compare the evaporator, thermal unit and filler at the intended concentration and temperature. In a ketchup line, compare batch preparation time with the continuous thermal and packing demand. Then examine reduced-feed operation and a downstream stop: buffer capacity and interlocks should manage normal fluctuations without relying on indefinite product holding.
Make the performance run reproducible
A meaningful production run records the accepted feed, product properties, operating duration, reject streams, stops and finished pack quantity. The test material and measurement locations are agreed before the run. Heat and cooling demand are measured for the same case as the reported output.
These records let the equipment duty be assessed separately from seasonal raw-material changes or packaging interruptions. They also provide the baseline for diagnosing a later loss in throughput.
No-loss solids balance
This theoretical illustration treats °Brix as a soluble-solids mass-fraction approximation. It excludes skins, seeds, rejects, washing water and processing losses. The result is not a saleable-yield prediction or an evaporator guarantee. Use measured refined-feed data and losses for engineering.
These bounds are calculator inputs, not machine capacities. In the ideal example, 5 t/h at 5 °Bx concentrated to 30 °Bx gives 0.833 t/h of paste and 4.167 t/h of removed water, before accounting for any rejects or losses.
Enter your values to compare the ideal solids balance.
- Theoretical paste
- Theoretical water removed
- Fresh-to-paste ratio
Further detail
Questions about this equipment and process
Is the calculator result a guaranteed paste yield?
No. It is an ideal soluble-solids comparison with losses excluded. Actual output depends on the accepted tomato feed, separation losses, retained product, processing conditions and the measured finished specification.
Are the calculator input limits equipment capacities?
No. They define the calculation tool’s supported input window. Equipment selection uses the actual duty and operating conditions.