World’s best output – 81 000 PET containers an hour

Producing 81 000 PET containers an hour with a single blow-moulding machine, and dressing and filling them as well in a monobloc comprising a blow-moulder, a labeller and a filler: this is currently the highest output worldwide that a beverage machinery manufacturer can offer. Krones AG already has this output up and running in several beverage plants.

With the latest generation of the Contiform 3 series, the market can now buy small cavity (SC) machines for the high-output range of up to 81 000 containers an hour. The high-speed stretch blow-moulding machine for containers sized at max. 0.75 litres is fitted with a newly developed blow-moulding station that operates entirely without lubrication. This reduces by 70 per cent the time needed for manual lubrication of the machine compared to the preceding model, and increases the machine’s availability levels. Four Contiform 3 SC machines are already delivering this output at a bottler in the USA. Two more machines have been ordered by another bottler. All six high-speed stretch blow-moulding machines produced so far have been integrated into ErgoBloc L wet-end monobloc.

The paramount goal of the companies’ innovations is to provide their users with low-maintenance, simple-to-operate machines with low standstill times. In addition, it had to be possible to synergise the individual machines quite easily to form integrated units, so as to minimise the complexity of production lines and upgrade their efficiency levels. The wet-end monobloc ErgoBloc L is a textbook example of this concept. Here, the company has integrated the technology of the Contiform 3 Small Cavity stretch blow-moulding machine for small containers with Contiroll labelling technology featuring a Multireel automatic reel magazine plus fillers from the new Modulfill series to create a purposefully synergised overall concept. The individual machines had been optimised beforehand with carefully chosen innovations for deployment in a monobloc configuration, and mutually networked using an intelligent control system. Thanks to these sophisticated design enhancements, the ErgoBloc L operates with significantly better cost-efficiency than previous line concepts. The total operating costs are up to ten per cent lower than for conventional bottling lines. In addition, the monobloc’s footprint is 30 per cent smaller.