Machinery: Page 829

Coding, Printing & Labeling

How low is low with carbs?

Responding to consumers’ heightened interest in consuming fewer carbohydrates, food companies are producing more low-carb foods. Manufacturers are asking FDA to set standards for low-carb foods similar to those for fat content.

January 31, 2004

Coding, Printing & Labeling

Calls for "Alcohol Facts" panel

The Center for Science in the Public Interest and the National Consumers League petitioned the Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau to require uniform “Alcohol Facts” labels on all alcoholic beverage packages.

January 31, 2004

Secondary Packaging

Unfinished business

As I began to gear up for 2004, I realized that my office was littered with a whole raft of news and feature story applications that, for a variety of reasons, were not published.

January 31, 2004

Secondary Packaging

Ingenious integration

An integrated printing system helps this case erector manufacturer reduce machine cost, better meet floor space requirements, and lower maintenance expense.

January 31, 2004

Converting equipment

Covert labels complete drug chain-of-custody

Security papers become pharmaceutical labels with a ‘history’ so that material can be tracked back to the mill.

January 31, 2004

Coding, Printing & Labeling

Terrorism concerns infiltrate packaging

New homeland security program sends packagers scurrying for protective and tracking technologies.

January 31, 2004

Conveying & accumulation

TMC debuts new tissue roll wrapper at Aantec customer event

A live demonstration of Tissue Machinery Company’s fast and flexible new Zero™ wrapper will highlight Appleton, WI-based Aantec’s March 2004 customer open house.

January 31, 2004

Controls & Machine Components

New drive family

The ACS 800 Family of drives from ABB are said to be 50% smaller than the company’s previous drives of equal HP. The units range from 6.5” wide for low-HP designs to freestanding 600-HP units that measure 13.78” wide to fit into deep, narrow spaces or wide, shallow spaces.

December 31, 2003

Conveying & accumulation

Poore: Snack line conveying to f/f/s

At Poore Brothers, three FastBack conveyors from Heat and Control carry snacks from three fryers to downstream vertical form/fill/seal machines.

December 31, 2003

Conveying & accumulation

Poore: Weigh scales for salty snacks

Cross-feeder conveyors deliver snacks to Ishida 14-head weigh scales from Heat and Control. Individual load cells measure the weight of product in the scales. Integrated controls are used to select the right combination of buckets to release an accurate amount of product into a bottom-sealed tube of film.

December 31, 2003

Bag/pouch fill/seal (pre-made bags)

Poore: Vertical form/fill/seal for snacks

This continuous-motion bagger from Heat and Control uses patented twin heat-sealing jaws that simultaneously seal the top of the leading pack and the bottom of the subsequent pack. These vf/f/s machines produce 1- to 3-oz bags for vending machine and multi-pack sales, at speeds to 150/min. That rate is three times faster than previous vf/f/s equipment.

December 31, 2003

Conveying & accumulation

Platinum Packaging Inc.: Friction feeding for gift box blanks

Contract packager Platinum Packaging employs nearly 50 Longford friction feeders that deliver gift box blanks from a magazine onto a lugged conveyor for downstream shrink wrapping. Feeders can also be set up to deliver calendars to a plow so that another downstream feeder can insert a paperboard card into the calendar. Dong so helps provide rigidity to the calendar after it's shrink-wrapped.

December 31, 2003