Newspaper Article 1994 – Idea to beat fruit bruising

Idea to beat fruit bruising

By Geoff Mercer
Staff reporter, Hastings

Hastings inventor Gary Bailey is out to beat fruit bruising.

“I eat, sleep and think about it all the time,” Mr Bailey said this week.

His first invention – a bin buffer which cushions the jolt when a forklift truck hits a bin of fruit – rolled off the production line in February.

His second – a bin skin which cushions fruit as it lands inside the bin – has just gone from prototype to production.

Mr Bailey said he watched a forklift working one day and decided there must be away to reduce damage to both bin and fruit when the driver misjudged and hit the bin too hard.

He designed a buffer to mount on the vertical arm of the forklift. The concept was refined by engineer Price McLaren Ltd, which manufactures it.

The buffer consists of coil springs mounted between stainless steel frames, one of which rests against the bin, the other being fixed to the fork.

Using stainless steel was a concession to vanity, he said. “I thought: ‘If it’s going to have my name on it, I want it shiny.’ I’m a bit of a weka.”

He rejected the option of patenting or copywriting his handiwork because to do so would have cost about $3000. He opted instead to sell aggressively and beat copycat manufacturers to the market.

Mr Bailey said he went out on the road for days “chasing orchardists”, securing 83 orders.

Many were cancelled after the March 2 hailstorm, but he has sold 40 sets of his buffers. They come in two sizes and cost $300 or $255.

The bin skins consist of strips of special foam which Mr Bailey staples to the inside of base boards in a bin.

Mr Bailey said he had fixed the foam to 100 bins since March and they had proved their worth.

Seventy per cent of bruising in a bin occurred in the bottom two layers of fruit. The foam helped to reduce that, he said.

“I aim to save the industry a lot of money.”