The main advantage of the Kramer Shear Cells (KSC), is that a large sample of the product can be tested at once. This gives a better average value of texture then testing one small piece of food multiple times and speeds texture assessment. The Kramer Shear Cell faithfully reproduces the actions of consumption by shearing, compressing and extruding the sample, measuring them together and providing increased reproducibility in a highly variable product.

One side effect from testing such an increased sample size is that higher forces are generated as a result. Since competitor systems cannot supply the higher forces, mock up designs like the “Mini Kramer/Ottawa Shear Cell” were developed to try and copy this original Allo-Kramer design. In a sense this defeats one of the big advantages derived from the ability to test larger samples.

FTC offers two additional variations of the standard fixture, CS-1. One version is made with stainless steel blades and a Delrin cell (CS-1A) for high acid food samples, like diced tomatoes and salsa. The CS-1-TU is calibrated with fresh peas for Tenderometer use and must be "paired and calibrated" with a Model FTA-TU Force transducer before use.

A modified version with thinner blades (thin blade cell CS-2) is also available.

Applications

• Quality and gristle content of ground beef
• Measure crispness of biscuit inclusions
• Curd firmness to assess bulk properties
• Moisture related toughness of croutons
• Test roasted vegetables to obtain batch optimization
• Measure the effect of cooking conditions on rice texture

Contents and summary

• Sample holder
• Slotted lid
• 10 Moveable blades

Notes

These fixtures are only suitable for use with:

1000 N or 2500 N loadcells and FTC dovetail top bracket (432-098 or 432-099), or FTA series force transducer.

This part is recommended instead of a mini shear cell or Ottowa cell fixture