In this article, Lawrence Rice-Williams, Head of Food and Beverage at 42T, examines how representative scale-down rigs can give manufacturers a safer, lower-cost way to trial process changes without disrupting live production. He explores why creating a smaller version of a manufacturing process is rarely as straightforward as it first appears, and offers insight into how manufacturers can approach this challenge.
Manufacturers are well versed in the challenges of scaling up. An exciting new product, formulation or process may work perfectly in research and development (R&D), only to reveal unexpected complications when translated to full production scale.
Less widely discussed but increasingly important is the opposite challenge: how to scale down.
Many manufacturing lines in the food and beverage sector have been running successfully for decades, operating continuously to deliver high-volume, high-value products at the throughputs demanded by the market. Now though, fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG) manufacturers face rising ingredient and energy costs, unstable supply chains, and growing pressures to integrate more sustainable ingredients or materials.
Making process changes is often harder than expected because formal standard operating procedures (SOPs) rarely capture the hidden tweaks and workarounds production teams use to keep things running smoothly.
In addition to this, taking critical production assets offline for experimentation is not practical. Even short interruptions can have significant commercial consequences, while large-scale pilot trials can be expensive and time-consuming.
As a result, many manufacturers are now investing in representative scale-down systems and rigs that allow lower cost, faster experimentation to support process innovation. However, designing these systems is seldom straightforward.
Why scale-down is harder than it looks
At first glance, scaling down a process can appear deceptively simple: just make a smaller version of the production equipment. In reality, manufacturing systems are governed by complex interactions between equipment geometry, materials, process conditions, control systems, and operator intervention.
A rig that looks like the real process is not necessarily one that behaves like it, and this becomes particularly challenging where processes involve non-linear behaviour.
Done well, scale-down capability enables safer offline trials, faster optimisation, reduced waste, and improved knowledge transfer across teams. It also allows manufacturers to continue innovating on long-established production assets without compromising throughput or product quality.
As published by Food & Drink Manufacturing UK magazine (July/August 2026 issue)
About the Author
Lawrence Rice-Williams
Senior Consultant
Lawrence is a Chartered Mechanical Engineer and Senior Consultant at 42T, with an MEng from the University of Leeds. Since joining 42T in 2019, Lawrence has worked across the medical, industrial, and consumer sectors, with a recent focus on innovation in the food and beverage industry.