Wine, Spirits in paper bottles!

A collaboration between Festo and PCE Automation has helped recyclable packaging experts Frugalpac Limited to achieve the high throughputs and precision assembly necessary to meet increased demand for its innovative paperboard Frugal Bottle.

Frugal Bottle is the world’s first paper wine and spirits bottle. Its innovative design comprises an outer made from 94% recycled paperboard with an inner food grade pouch. The bottle is fully recyclable, is five times lighter than glass and has a much lower carbon footprint than traditional wine bottles. It also offers 360-degree branding for better impact on the shelf.

Frugal Bottles are manufactured from two paperboard blanks that are precision cut, glued and then wetted front and back, before being stacked ready for feeding into the bottle forming machine. Achieving the desired throughputs is a major challenge because the glue pathway is complex and must be tailored to the profile of the bottle. In addition, the correct amount of glue has to be applied to prevent malformation or unsightly glue excess on the finished bottle.

They had approached an adhesive systems company for a solution, but they were unable to achieve the desired cycle times. Working closely together, PCE Automation and Festo developed a fully automated gluing and wetting line to meet the tight tolerances and complex gluing patterns necessary to deliver throughputs of 630 bottles per hour.

Ronan Quinn, project manager for PCE, says: “The gluing process was more complex than anything we’d encountered before. Tight tolerances on the gluing pattern combined with a short cycle time and critical bead thicknesses were a real challenge. We would usually undertake the entire design and assembly inhouse, but on this occasion Festo supplied the handling gantries to us fully assembled which added real value in terms of component compatibility and commissioning.”

The automation cell provided by PCE Automation requires minimal human intervention. An operator loads the blanks for the front and back of the bottles at the front end. The machine then picks, loads, transfers, glues, transfers again, wets and conveys the prepared blanks into a container at the end of process. The prepared blanks are then transferred to the bottle forming machine.

PCE Automation used the Festo Handling Guide Online (HGO) to design the automation cell. This free online tool dramatically reduces design, assembly and delivery time and enables customers to create a ready-to-install handling system: whether for a single-axis system, a 2D linear and planar surface gantry or a 3D gantry. With just a few clicks, the HGO delivers the right standard handling system, including CAD model, animation, and complete EPLAN schematic documentation. The individual steps (including RFQ, layout, quotation and CAD design), which previously could take 10 to 15 days, can be completed in a matter of minutes. The reduction in design and documentation time enabled PCE to meet Frugalpac’s delivery expectations.

The unique gluing and wetting solution was tested and sized at Festo’s British Application Centre to prove that the desired cycle times could be achieved. It uses the Festo CPX-E-CEC Controller as the PLC to deliver interpolated soft motion, controlling multiple axes at the same time to achieve the complex curves on the glue paths. Festo CMMT servo controllers feature in the three handling systems for precise and repeatable loading, gluing and unloading. Festo core pneumatics products, valve terminals and process valves are also used extensively throughout the gluing and wetting system.

Bottling success
The PCE automation cell needed to achieve a cycle time of just 19 seconds to meet Frugalpac’s requirements. The gluing and wetting solution delivers a gluing time that is 50% faster than specified, enabling the entire machine to meet the overall cycle times required. It achieves this by batch-gluing eight bottles simultaneously, with different glue patterns being applied to the front and back blanks.

John-Paul Grogan, Product Director at Frugalpac, says: “Frugalpac is committed to the development of more sustainable packaging. The application of automation in the production of Frugal Bottle will help us to achieve our aim of reducing the carbon of wine and spirits packaging.”

Festo and PCE are now working with Frugalpac to develop an automated method for the forming of the Frugal Bottle itself.

@festo_global @FestoIE_NIE @frugalpac #PCEAutomation #PAuto #Food_Drink

Spicing up automation!

When PCE Automation was challenged with designing a new handling system for automating the manufacture of a brand new concept of spice jar lid by plastics manufacturer RPC Halstead, it turned to Festo.

“Festo brings variety to the spice of life”

The ‘Spoonkler’ lid manufactured by RPC Halstead, for its end customer Bart Ingredients, is an innovative flip-top cap that can be opened in two ways, either to reveal a collection of small holes through which the spice can be sprinkled, or a full opening wide enough to fit a teaspoon. For this demanding project RPC invested in special manufacturing equipment from PCE Automation. The new cap presented some unique handling challenges requiring an innovative mechanism designed by PCE with support from the Festo application engineering team.

“A particular challenge of the design is the cap’s opposing side hinges, which enables it to be opened in either spoon or sprinkle mode,” says Julian Tarratt, sales manager at PCE Automation. “We have used Festo equipment in our machines for a number of years and we are always pleased with the wide range, high quality and reliability, which are vital to us being confident in delivering high performance machines to our customers. So naturally, for this project, we turned to Festo again, but even with the range we needed to do something special.”

In addition to the unique hinges, there were a number of additional challenges and constraints. First, the robot had to be designed with a small footprint so it could fit easily next to the plastic injection moulding machine.

Second, to remove the tooling from the plastic moulding machine, a crane needed to fit between the machine and the robot. The robot arm that collects the moulded caps therefore needed to be completely retractable from the moulding machine, to allow the crane access when required.

Finally, the machine required more operations than are typically used in alternative cap moulding applications in order to close the caps’ two opposing hinges, which need to be shut directly after moulding.

PCE Automation designed a side entry robot that uses a Festo high speed electric axis and pneumatics. However, as the electric axis needed to be fully retractable, PCE Automation adapted one of the electro-mechanical belt drive axis and designed a bespoke solution. The company’s specialists came up with an ingenious method of piggy-backing two linear electric axes together, to form a telescopic arm that could be fully withdrawn from the injection moulding machine, therefore enabling the crane easy entry.

“We are delighted to have worked with PCE Automation on the project,” says Allan Price, Business Development Consultant at Festo. “Prior to PCE manufacturing the handling arm, we worked closely with their design team, discussing their requirements and advising whether it was feasible, and would deliver the high quality results the company was looking for. We’re very pleased it does!”

In the process 12 caps are injection moulded in black polypropylene. The Cartesian robot arm enters the moulding machine to remove the un-folded caps and once returned to the automated machine, the first hinge is folded shut. The machine then uses Festo pneumatics to accurately and reliably move the caps to the next process, where the second hinge is folded, before being transferred to the conveyor at the end of the assembly line.

“We have applied the extensive automation experience we have amassed over the years to design this new automation handling solution,” said Julian. “The Festo products provided an ideal platform for us to build upon and the fact the parts were readily available within a few days meant we could pull the design together and build and deliver our machines more quickly.”

“This has been a real team effort with PCE Automation and Festo both rising to the challenge,” says Andy Edwards, Engineering & Technical Manager at RPC Halstead. “We are delighted with the performance of the new robot and since installing it, we have been able to manufacture the lids for the spice jars reliably, while operating efficiently, and most importantly, our end customer Bart Ingredients is also pleased with the results, as the Spoonkler cap delivers market-leading functionality, allowing consumers the choice of spooning or sprinkling.”