Page 41 - Packaging News magazine March_April 2023

Robots can change between products in seconds. Some applications, such as palletisers, can change on the fly han- dling bags and boxes simultaneously.
4FLEXIBILITY
A labeller may, with changeover, apply labels to round and square bot- tles and still be considered flexible. But it can only label. It can’t apply a cap or load a carton.
Robots are universal machines. When a new product fails, as 60 to 70 per cent do, the robot can be repurposed. The robot that is capping today, can be loading cartons tomorrow. If there is no internal use, it can be sold on the secondary market. It won’t become a warehouse zombie.
5LABOUR
Got people? Skilled workers are hard to find. Automation is a solution, but some tasks are difficult or uneco- nomical to automate. For those tasks are unergonomic, and unloved, like palletising, robots free a scarce skilled workforce.
Technicians are even harder to find. The simplicity and standardisation of robots makes training easier and makes operators more effective.
6SPEED
Many packagers think they want speed when what they really want is production in the form of product efficiency. Robot machines may not always be as fast as purpose-built, high-speed machines, but this may not matter. The greater uptime of robot machines, due to reduced changeover, better reliability, and ease of repair, can make up for slower speeds. A 150ppm robot line running at 80 per cent uptime will produce the same amount as a 300ppm line running at 40 per cent uptime. It is likely to do it more cheaply, as well.
THE PLOT THICKENS
Robots are the Packaging Line of Tomorrow (PLOT), but what will this line look like? A typical bottling line, might consist of the following robot machinery: • BOTTLE ORIENTER – Bottles are dumped
into a hopper which deposits them onto a rotating disc or conveyor. A camera identifies the position and orientation of each bottle, directing the robot. The robot picks the bottle, orients it and places it upright on the filler infeed conveyor.
• FILLER – Bottles are spaced onto the filler conveyor using servo drives. The filler is an articulated arm robot with filling nozzles on the end. The robot tracks the bottles, filling them in a continuous motion.
• CAPPER – A similar system is used for capping. Caps are staged for pickup by a cap sorter. Capping chucks on the robot arm pick the caps from the sorter, place the caps on the bottles and torques them down. As with the filler, this is done with the bottles in continuous motion.
Above: Robot case erector. (Image: Universal Robots)
Far left, top: Robotic case loader. (Image: HMPS)
Far left, below: Robot bottle orienter – the robot picks the bottle, orients it and places it upright on the filler infeed conveyor. (Image: U2 Robotics)
• CASE ERECTOR – A collaborative robot picks a case blank from a magazine and pops it open. It passes the case over static guides to close the bottom flaps and places it on a conveyor for loading.
• CASE LOADER – The erected case is con- veyed to a second robot which picks the bottles and loads them into the case. A second cobot picks 12 bottles from the conveyor, places them in the case, and pushes it into a top and bottom sealer.
• In some applications, case erection and loading can be handled by a sin- gle robot.
• PALLETISER – At the end of the line a robot stacks each completed case onto a pallet for shipment.
Robot machines, of course, are not just for bottling lines. Virtually any packaging operation can be automated with robots.
Manufacturers have always had to choose between the flexibility of manual labour and the efficiency of automation. Modern robots merge both. The time has come to take full advan- tage of them. ■
Automation Advances
The bagging process shown in these images would usually require two or three human operators. It is automated using two collaborative robots. The first robot picks and opens the empty bag, holding it under the filler. Once filled, it passes the bag through the sealer. A second robot takes the sealed bag and places it in the case.
In addition to placing the bag in the case, the second robot performs other functions. As shown, it is palletising finished cases. The suction cups are used to position the empty cases for loading. An automatic tool changer above the yellow gripper allows it to be swapped with tote handling tooling. It’s pretty hard to beat that for flexibility.
Above: Collaborative robot bag picker, filler, sealer. A second cobot will fulfil the case-packing function. (Image: Universal Robots)
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ROBOTICS & AUTOMATION