Conveying & accumulation

Manual dumping station

Flexicon (Phillipsburg, NJ) has developed a Manual Dumping Station configured for direct connection to flexible screw conveyors. It collects dust created during manual dumping of powder and bulk solid materials from bags, boxes, drums and other containers.

December 31, 1996

Containers & Closures: Page 249

Containers

Proximity sensors

A new ultrasonic series of 18-mm, cylindrical proximity sensors is now available from Hyde Park Electronics (Dayton, OH). Applications for the Model SM600/SM650 include cap presence and/or tilt detection, fill-level check, nonmetallic container counting, fill-tube presence monitoring, downed container detection and case inspection.

December 31, 1996

Conveying & accumulation

Shrink bander sets a quicker pace

Replacing a p-s labeler with a shrink bander nearly triples production speeds for vials of "super glue" used to attach artificial fingernails. Additional benefits include longer shelf life and stronger sales appeal.

December 31, 1996

Blisters/clamshells/skin packaging

No clear 'vision' from FDA on label inspection

Agency hopes to give additional detailed directions to drug manufacturers on the requirements for verifying cut labels and other components.

December 31, 1996

Sustainability

Thinking small pays off big

High-accuracy monobloc filler/dropper tip inserter/capper at CP Packaging handles thin, softwall bottles and lightweight tips at 60/min for 3-mL containers of diagnostic reagents.

December 31, 1996

Sustainability

Plastic beer bottle could be big

Australian brewing giant Carlton United Breweries has high hopes for a barrier beer bottle made of plastic. In the meantime, it's launched a monolayer PET bottle that's causing quite a stir.

December 31, 1996

Converting equipment

Graphics, coex make for noteworthy tube

Colgate-Palmolive Canada is counting on graphics representing a trio of Looney Tunes characters from Space Jam to spark sales of its Colgate Junior brand toothpaste.

December 31, 1996

Containers

Recycling programs

Return Logistics (Elmhurst, IL) offers recycling programs for industrial packagers aimed at increasing the number of steel drums that are returned to the proper recycling facilities.

November 30, 1996

Containers

Tube production line

The SFM Line® is a modular tube production line from Automation Industrielle (Vouvry, Switzerland) that allows producers to gradually increase capacity as necessary without having to reinvest in tooling.

November 30, 1996

Secondary Packaging

Palletizer/stretch wrapper

The Stackwrap(TM) is a new automatic palletizer/stretch wrap- per from Crown-Simplimatic (Lynchburg, VA). Cases, cartons, bags, pails and trays are lifted, shuttled horizontally and positioned on pallets, slip sheets, or directly on the machine's turntable, where they are wrapped at speeds of four cycles/min.

November 30, 1996

Filling/capping, liquid & viscous

New bottle packers help Modelo deal with refillables

Southern Mexican brewery installs high-speed rotary bottle packers that are now used throughout Modelo's system. Efficency soars even with returnable cases of marginal quality.

November 30, 1996

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

Duralam presses for short and sweet runs

Flexible packaging converter Duralam is among the first to use a quick changeover flexo press for short-run jobs. One of its most challenging is a reverse-printed OPP structure used for bags of Sun*Maid candy.

November 30, 1996

Conveying & accumulation

McKesson brings PET packing in-house

Fast-growing California water bottler is learning to appreciate the advantages of in-house filling, after long relying on contract bottlers for its half-, 1- and 1.5-L PET bottles.

November 30, 1996