Size code
Orange size 3, and the uniformity bracket it sits in
Size 3 is the smallest orange code that sits inside the standard's widest uniformity bracket, so a package built around it is allowed more variation between its largest and its smallest fruit than any code below. One millimetre of diameter decides that. Three of the four lines in our catalogue pack it as a matter of course.
The figures
| Size code | 3 |
|---|---|
| Diameter range | 81–92 mm |
| Varieties we pack in this size | Clementina Clemenules, Navel Foios, Navelina |
| Spread allowed in one package, smallest fruit from 80 mm | 20 mm |
| Spread allowed, smallest fruit from 60 mm to 79 mm | 15 mm |
What it changes on an order
You buy fruit sized by range rather than by code
The standard offers two ways to size a package and they do not give the same answer. Sizing by range at this diameter permits a wider spread than the code band itself, which is how a load stays compliant and still looks mixed on the belt.
You are writing an arrival tolerance
Put the bracket you expect into the contract instead of assuming it. Two packers sizing honestly under different options will hand you two visibly different pallets, and neither of them has broken a rule.
You are planning across the campaign
Our late navel does not list this code among the sizes it fills routinely, so an order holding this size from the start of the campaign through to spring needs a conversation about the back end of the season before it is signed.
What this note does not settle
- Which uniformity option a packing house applies is its decision. This page explains the brackets and does not commit our packer to either of them.
- The harvest windows behind the calendar remark above are generic for this growing area. Our own picking dates are still to be confirmed.
- Nothing here fixes a count per box.
Two ways to size a package
The standard lets a packer size by code or by range, and a buyer who has only ever seen codes is surprised by what the second option permits. Sizing by range sets the allowed spread from the smallest fruit in the box, and the allowance widens in steps as the fruit grows. This code sits just over one of those steps.
A single millimetre of diameter separates it from the bracket below. Nothing about the fruit changes across that millimetre. What changes is how much variation a compliant package is entitled to show, and that difference is visible on the belt long before it shows up in a document.
The size that leaves with the early fruit
Our late navel does not list this code among the sizes it fills as a matter of course. Everything else in the catalogue does. A programme built on this size therefore has a shape in the calendar, and the shape is at the back end of it.
Buyers holding one size from the opening of the campaign through to its close find this out in spring rather than in autumn, which is the expensive way round. Raising it while the order is still a draft turns a substitution into a plan, and a plan is something a grower picks to.
Talk to the grower
Tell us the variety, the sizes and the delivery week you need. You get a delivered price and what we can commit to in writing, from the person who picks the fruit.
The grower handles enquiries. Response times are still to be confirmed.