The diversity of developments that has been recently announced by packaging and labelling companies shows the industry to be flourishing with a wide range of new products that help food producers increase efficiency and decrease costs.
Technology firm Lantech, for example, has just launched two new continuous-motion shrink-wrap machines designed to cut processing time and limit the need for line stoppage.
The new SW-2000 belt in-feed is designed to bring even quality to the shrink-wrap process, while the SW-3000 flight-lug machine features on-the-fly tracking adjustment and sealing systems that never need cleaning. The firm claims that both innovations are ideal for contract packagers and retailers.
The machines deliver rates up to 60 and 75packs/minute, respectively, and are especially suited for end-of-the-line wrapping where uptime is at a premium, changeovers frequent, and packages come in all shapes.
"These machines take the art out of shrink wrapping and will change market perceptions that shrink is a temperamental wrap process,“ said Jean-Louis Limousin, Lantech'. The company has won an export award from the UK'ss business leader for shrink wrap. "During our development programme, we visited hundreds of wrapping operations and learned that rework rates of 20percent were common.“
The two new machines are suited for polyolefin, PVC and LDPE films. The SW-2000 provides electronic product spacing for random product lengths and can be used with belted, flight-bar or flight-lug in-feeds. The flight-lug infeed on the SW-3000 provides tighter control of unstable products.
"All settings are related to package dimensions in a systematic way,“ said Limousin. "Once the package height and width dimensions are known, the operator simply sets the scales on the machine, threads film, loads product and is ready to run with little or no tuning, which can be accomplished if necessary at the control panel while the machine is working.“
Set-up parameters are displayed in a single view on the colour touch-screen LCD control, mounted on a swing arm. Up to 16 set-ups can be stored in memory and the control system has three levels of access, all password protected.
Premier labelling
Harland Machine Systems supplies high quality pressure-sensitive labelling machines to blue chip customers worldwide. This is a highly competitive market where, surprisingly, Roger Jenkins, sales and marketing director says the company is not the cheapest supplier and may sometime be the most expensive.
But, he adds, customers know they are receiving the highest specifications in design, manufacture and performance. This outlook also applies to customer service and the company is well represented on the ground around the world. Harland won an Export Achievement Award from the UK's Processing and Packaging Machinery Association for its export successes.
But however good the packaging and labelling may be, the contents have to remain intact and David Kerr, senior lecturer in the Wolfson School of Mechanical and Manufacturing Engineering at Loughborough University has been researching an innovative food package sealing and inspection system for trayed foods.
He says seal leakage creates major problems and high costs in remediation. Existing sealing machines have low flexibility and high capital cost in terms of machine tooling while cleaning and changing heads can mean prolonged down times.
In conjunction with a number of commercial firms, Kerr has developed a laser sealing machine that seals film to tray without the need for tooling. The non-contact technique provides the maximum operational flexibility, enabling different package shapes to be processed on the same production line. The laser also cuts the film after sealing.
Results show superior sealing characteristics using the conventional polypropylene and PET material combination. The seal is stronger but easier for the consumer to peel off.
Loughborough University has pioneered design activities over many years and was one of the first UK universities to embrace mechatronics. Its research group has a strong national and international profile.
Container material
There are also new developments in bottle-type containers. Eastman Chemical claims a breakthrough in the manufacture of PET resin with a new process called IntegRex. This involves changes to the manufacturing process rather than in chemistry or raw materials.
Like current PET technology, IntegRex is a polycondensation process that utilises purified terephthalic acid and ethylene glycol. "We just get there in a different way,“ says Allan Rothwell, president of group company Voridian.
Dr Greg Nelson, Voridian's vice-president of technology, says the new technology reduces costs of energy, labour, process steps, and equipment. A key feature is the elimination of the solid-stating process, which by itself cuts manufacturing costs by 15percent. Eastman said a plant using the IntegRex technology would be able to produce twice as much polymer while occupying about half the area of a current plant.
The company is set to build a 350000tonne integrated PET manufacturing facility using the new IntegRex technology at its existing site in Columbia, US. It says the PET packaging industry growth rates are driven by continued strong demand for existing and new packaging applications for the material and this is expected to continue for some considerable time.
Container design
Graham Packaging has developed a new technology that could herald a significant move away from glass packaging and towards plastic. The company claims that its proprietary Active Transverse Panel (ATP) bottle gives manufacturers design freedom and flexibility in creating a packaging identity never before available in plastic.
The new concept is the first panel-free hot-fill polyethylene terephthalate (PET) bottle, and has been described by the company as the answer to current hot-fill bottling needs. The ATP technology enables 100percent of the air to be removed from the package without the use of traditional panels.
Paul Bailie, director of business development for Graham Packaging, says: "The Holy Grail of hot-fill is to eliminate vacuum panels and achieve design freedom without being encumbered by the geometry of the design and this is exactly what we have done. The development is aimed directly at conversion from glass to plastic. The traditional way to design a hot-fill bottle was to build in areas or panels that would absorb product contraction. Designing this technology to negate the need for panels is a whole new mindset.“
The ATP bottle is blow-moulded on standard equipment but enhanced through proprietary mould designs. Bailie said the ATP bottle is perfect for teas and juices currently supplied in glass or panelled plastic and has already been adopted by major companies.
He added that a major advantage of ATP technology is that the container does not need to be symmetrical in the way traditional hot-fill packaging needs to be. With ATP, containers can be any shape: rectangular, square, or oval, for example. "If it can be blown into a bottle, it can now be hot-filled.“
The elimination of panels also eliminates label crinkle so ATP allows brand owners to use film labelling. If the label is clear, the product will show through, since the label is flat against the bottle.
The smooth bottle also is freezer friendly. Ice or water cannot accumulate behind the label and then drip out when removed from the cold. The bottle is dent resistant and so is ideally suited for vending. The top-load strength is 50100 per cent better than traditional hot-fill, opening up new possibilities for distribution.
Graham Packaging Company is a worldwide leader in the design, manufacture and sale of customised blow-moulded plastic containers for the branded food, beverage and other markets. It employs some 4000people at 56plants throughout North America, Europe and South America. It produced more than nine billion units and had total worldwide net sales of US$978.7million in 2003.
But whatever the technology used in manufacture, bottles have to be tested for integrity and VBS has developed a new pressure tester for non-carbonated drinks containers. The company says it is ideal for processors who need to carry out high volumes of pressure testing.
The small, portable unit has been specifically designed with pneumatic test actuation for repeatable test results. The company claims that the device will simplify the testing process as the pneumatically operated unit allows manufacturers to achieve consistency of test results from different operators.
This should be of great benefit to companies who routinely need to meet quality standards. It matches standard 28mm and 38mm neck finishes and its neck support system eliminates crushed bottles. The firm claims that even lightweight PET can be accurately evaluated, and that operators will find the results easy to read on the 060psi pressure gauge. The new pressure tester joins VBS' line of automatic filling equipment.
