Distribution Equipment

1. Distribution Equipment

2. Distribution Equipment Macchine automatiche situate dopo la macchina riempitrice (filling machine) • Accumulators • Cap Applicators • Card-Board Packers • Film Wrappers • Handle Applicators • Straw Applicators • etc..

3. Accumulator floating gear

4. THE TETRA HELIX 21 consists of two parallel conveyors, which operate at the same speed yet, are independent of one another. The one conveyor is for infeed, the other for outfeed. Between the two conveyors, and at the heart of the system, is a floating gear. When the production line is operating normally and both conveyors are running at the same pace, the gear remains in a fixed position between the two conveyors. When a stoppage occurs, one of the conveyors will slow down or stop moving (the infeed conveyor if the stoppage is upstream, the outfeed conveyor if it is downstream).

5. The floating gear immediately registers the stoppage and begins to move up/downwards in an ever-expanding spiral, enabling the unaffected conveyor to accumulate packages. A constant package flow is maintained without the packages scuffing against the conveyor or coming into contact with one another. When the problem has been rectified and production has been restarted, the conveyor affected by the stoppage will again start moving at the same pace as the other conveyor. The floating gear retracts and the packages which have been accumulated are then discharged in the same order as when they were admitted. Each package reenters the production line in the same perfect condition as when it entered.

6. Cap Applicator animation

7. General Description • The machine shown before is the Tetra Cap Applicator 88. It is used for the purpose of attaching a recloseable screw Cap. • Packages must have a pre-punched hole in the packaging material. The cap is attached over the pre-punched hole by means of hot melt. Tetra Cap Applicator 88 consists of the following sections: • Applicator, • Mechanical Feeder • Cap Magazine with Paddle Elevator.

8. Package infeed • The packages are taken on a conveyor from the packaging machine to the cap applicator. When the cap is correctly positioned, the brake restarts and feeds the package into the carrier chain. The purpose of the brake is to separate and space the packages, so that they are placed correctly in the carrier chain of the machine. The brake consists of the two belts, between which the packages are to pass. A space between the individual packages is created, due to the speed of the brake being slower than that of the conveyor. The brake belts are driven by an electric motor via a worm gear and a drive belt. The motor is activated by photocells before and after the brake.

9. Cap Handling • A paddle elevator collects the caps from a cap magazine, taking them up to a mechanical feeder. The feeder turns the cap so they are correctly oriented. Than the caps travel into the applicator on a cap conveyor. • The paddle elevator consists of a belt with carriers, taking the caps from the magazine up to the mechanical feeder. The mechanical feeder orients the caps to be positioned with the screw cap downwards. There are three air nozzles, which blow away caps that are wrongly positioned. In the cap conveyor there are two photocells that indicates the below-minimum (not enough caps) and maximum (conveyor full) amount of caps. • Cap application • At the end of the conveyor there is a cap pusher, which feeds the caps into an indexing wheel. The indexing wheel consists of an aluminium disc with recesses for 8 caps. The indexing wheel is driven, through a gear, by a belt connected to the main shaft of the machine. The gear turns the disc forwards in 45° step. Before the application unit, hot melt is forced in a circular shape on the cap. After a second indexing the cap is collected by the applicator chain and is taken on towards the package. The package is moved forward, while at the same time, the cap on the chain moves forwards at the same speed and in position above the package.

10. Hot melt applicator Applicator chain

11. On the applicator chain there are several cams that drives the chain units: • keeps the cap in position (pick cap align); • presses the cap on the packages until the hot melt has solidified (apply cap align); • releases the cap just before the discharge point (release cap).

12. Cardboard Packer

13. The packages are transported from the packaging machine to the Cardboard Packer by a conveyor. • The packages are separated by belts so that they can be counted and be distributed into lanes. In the lanes the packages form queues and it’ possible to form different packaging pattern (with nxm packages). • A brake is activated to create a gap between the groups of packages. • A loader pushes in the packages on the tray blank. • The two long sides of the tray are folded in. • The tray passes the hot melt guns which apply hot melt to the two minor flaps of the long sides. • In the compression station, the flaps of the tray are kept under pressure while the adhesive solidifies.

14. Film Wrapper Tetra Film Wrapper is used to wrap Tetra Brik packages in stretched film. The machine capacity is set in accordance with the capacity of the filling machine. It can also be provided with a design correction system for printed film.

15. General description • Infeed • The packages are transferred from the filling machine to the Film Wrapper on a conveyor. The packages are counted by photocells. When the correct number of packages has passed the photocell brake stops. The feed stop divides the packages into two lanes. • Grouping • The machine has two magazines for stretch film reels, one upper and one lower. There is a pusher that makes one, two or three strokes before the sealing is performed. • Wrapping • There are film brakes that stop the film feed. As the wrapping is completed, the film will be stretching around the package group by a jaw driven by a pneumatic cilinder. • Sealing • A knife goes up and cuts the film, which is than sealed by a constantly warm heating jaw. When the sealing is completed the knife and the heating jaw return to their lower position and the sealing will be cooled by compressed air.

16. Handle Applicator

17. 2 • The machine applies handles to units wrapped in film. • The tape is delivered in reels (1) and the paper labels are delivered pre-cut. Paper labels (2) are fed into the machine via a magazine and applied to the adhesive tape. Thereafter the handle is transferred to the units via a paddle (3). During the rotation of the paddle the handle is cut off by a knife. • When entering the Tetra Handle Applicator the units are separated to create the necessary gap for the application. The units are fed through the machine in a constant flow to avoid queuing. 3

18. Straw Applicator

19. The packages are fed on the conveyor (1). The infeed break separates the packages. When a package is registered by the first photocell (2), the hotmelt gun (3) applies two dots of hotmelt onto the package. The package continues on the conveyor and is registered by the second photocell (4), which starts the straw application cycle (feed wheel, forks). The chain (5) brings the package in position, the revolver feed wheel (6) moves one position and the forks (7) press the straw to the hotmelt dots on the package. • The brake belt is driven by a frequency converter and it has 2 speeds according with the upstream queue of packages. • The servomotor on the strawfeed unit has a fixed speed. If the belt brake speeds up, then the servo stop time between two indexes is consequently reduced.