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A sausage filling machine is used to fill various meat doughs into casings, cans, jars, and other containers. The most common type of filling machine used by small and medium-sized businesses is the piston type. The piston moves in the cylinder, pushing the meat material through the filling nozzle (funnel, cornucopia) into the container. The hydraulic piston sausage maker is a floor-standing model for small and medium-sized businesses. A hand-filling machine is usually sufficient, and sometimes even a simple hand funnel is used to fill the meat mixture into the casings. Continuous vacuum filling machines are filling machines used in large operations. During the filling process, large amounts of trapped air are removed from the product, helping to improve the color and texture of the finished product. These sausage-filling machines are usually equipped with dividing, rotating, and casing clamping devices for filling "agglomerated" (folded) uncut collagen and plastic casings.