Bottles line up for Palletiser
September 1st 2011 Micromech Systems and Parker have
been collaborating on solutions for
food processing equipment and
packaging machinery manufacturers.
In many filling systems, one of the
challenges frequently faced by
manufacturers is the need to separate
a single lane continuous product
stream of bottles into several lanes in
order to bundle them suitably for
palletising.
The main issue is that obviously
bottles require careful handling at
high speeds with high dynamic
response. The limited stroke length
of the linear actuators regularly used
in these applications also limits the
flexibility of the machine.
In partnership with a manufacturer
of conveyor systems for bottles and
pallet systems a new sync gate was
created. The distribution of the
product stream took place via a twoaxis
system with one axis placed
orthogonally to the travel direction
and a linear drive parallel to the
conveyor. A ready-to-mount standard
linear actuator with toothed belt was
used for this purpose where at the
time of distribution, the linear
actuator moves synchronously to the
conveyor speed. The distributor lid is
mounted on the linear actuator. The
actuator is first synchronised to the
conveyor speed in order to split the
product stream and then moves
orthogonally to the conveyor
direction. After completion of the
cross movement, the linear actuator
returns to its original position.
In addition to the linear actuator
the solution included two servo
drives and a complete software
technology package. If required the
servo drives can be integrated via a
communication bus option to all
common control environments.
Thanks to the complete application
solution installed it was also possible
to bring the machine to market with
minimised engineering overhead
saving expensive building costs for
customers.
This advance allowed the machine
manufacturer to offer a machine that
speeded uppacking and palletising
and as a result their customers are
delighted with higher productivity
andreduced costs. More articles from Micromech Limited: | 
