Controls & Machine Components

Wago Corporation: Catalog/design tool

Wago’s (Germantown, WI) newest version of ProServe Software, Version 2.5, now features expanded functionality of the Smart Designer for custom rail assembly, allowing customers to design, mark, document, and test their own rail-mounted terminal block assemblies.

August 31, 2001

Leaders (UNIVERSAL TAXONOMY PW): Page 1638

Controls & Machine Components

Norstat,Inc: Safety switches

Furtif AMX is the name of a series of non-contact, magnetically coded safety switches that are bolted or screwed to packaging equipment or doors to prevent operators from potential injury when opening equipment that’s running.

August 31, 2001

Controls & Machine Components

lpha gear drives, Inc: Servo gearhead

Alpha gear drives (Elk Grove Village, IL) has released the TP-High Torque planetary gearhead for dynamic servo applications. Gearhead offers 110% higher torque, 50% greater rigidity, and 700% higher overload safety over the classic TP design.

August 31, 2001

Controls & Machine Components

Patlite: Signal towers

he LME-Q Quad-Color series signal tower from Patlite (Torrance, CA) is used to indicate machine status. Tower provides four indicator colors in a single stack.

August 31, 2001

Controls & Machine Components

Exlar Corporation: Exlar Corporation: Integrated actuators

The SR Series of inverted roller screw actuators from Exlar (Minneapolis, MN) offers higher speed and load capacity than ball screw actuators and other traditional rotary-to-linear conversion mechanisms, company says.

August 31, 2001

Controls & Machine Components

Zarpac Performance Index Inc: Zarpac Performance Index Inc: Improved line performance software

Zarpac Inc. (Oakville, Ontario, Canada) introduces Performance Index (PI) V5.1, an easy-to-install software program designed to monitor the performance of a single machine or an entire packaging line.

August 31, 2001

Controls & Machine Components

ARC Advisory Group: Factory automation study

End users responsible for implementing factory automation systems and their suppliers may find beneficial a study titled “Distributed Intelligence Architecture for the Factory of the Future.” From ARC Advisory Group (Dedham, MA), the study analyzes, compares, and forecasts the future of the PLC in the age of distributed control to help guide users in systems design, and to help suppliers plan new products based on end-user needs.

August 31, 2001

Controls & Machine Components

Phoenix Contact Inc: Interbus diagnostic software

Phoenix Contact (Harrisburg, PA) has released Diag+ diagnostic software suitable for start-up or troubleshooting an Interbus system. Software can be easily integrated into any visualization software package, eliminating the need to create custom diagnostic code or user interfaces to display the diagnostic information, company says.

August 31, 2001

Labels

Nestlé tests an award-winning can

Consumers on the go continue to drive packaging development around the world. This time it’s a self-heating can of coffee from Nestlé UK.

August 31, 2001

Secondary Packaging

Furman Foods: Depalletizing

At this canner of tomatoes, tomato sauces, canned beans and related products, filled, unlabeled steel cans arrive stacked in layers on pallets.

August 31, 2001

Conveying & accumulation

Furman Foods: Tray packing, stacking and wrapping

At this canner of tomatoes, tomato sauces, canned beans and related products, labeled cans are mechanically grouped in continuous motion in four or six lanes to yield 3x4- (shown) or 4x6-count trays, respectively.

August 31, 2001

Blisters/clamshells/skin packaging

New blisterpack safety protoco

EXCLUSIVE NEWS FROM OUR EUROPEAN PARTNER: A NEW protocol testing standard for blister packs is to be published in November. The move has been announced by the British Standards Institute following prompting from the Department of Health. Click logo for full article.

August 31, 2001

Flexibles

Pasta found in pouches

Recently spotted by Packaging World editors at Chicago-area Dominick’s and Jewel grocery stores is a new Barilla pasta line packaged in what appears to be paper/foil-laminated stand-up pouch holding 8.9 oz of uncooked, dry pasta.

August 31, 2001