Exactly the right dose

Quick adaptation

Thanks to its modular concept, the flat pouch machine is freely scalable from three lanes up to twelve lanes. The number of lanes depends on the required output and pouch sizes. With the new decentralized dosing system, each lane has its own dosing chamber and a stock of product.

“The separation of the feeding devices creates flexibility in a number of areas. Now different products, such as salt and pepper, can be packaged at the same time on one machine,” explained Rolf Steinemann, Product Manager at Bosch Packaging Systems.

Long sealing times at low temperatures guarantee hermetically tight packages, thus ensuring high product quality. The hygienic and ergonomic design makes the Sigpack VPF easy to access, as well as easy to oversee and clean. “Short cleaning and changeover times contribute to high overall equipment effectiveness,” said Steinemann. Precise dosing, deep pouch filling and hermetically tight seams reduce product loss and waste. This makes the packaging process more cost-effective for manufacturers. In particular for the pharmaceutical industry, these qualities contribute greatly to patient safety as over- or under-dosing of powdered medication can be avoided.

Exactly the right dose every time

The filling mechanism is based on an auger dosing system, known for its high degree of accuracy. Intelligent trend control allows readjustment for more precise dosing. “In the first design for the Sigpack VPF we were planning to use the MPA valve manifold from Festo, which would have allowed us to have product feeding per lane with vacuum and compressed air supply while also having two-chamber separation,” explained Maik Lamprecht, Project Manager for the development of the Sigpack VPF.This would have required additional cleaning components and a proportional valve for each lane.

Formats at the push of a button

“The Festo Motion Terminal VTEM made product feeding so much easier,” said Lamprecht, because it allowed every lane to be adjusted individually at the push of a button. “We use only a third as many valve slices and the flat pouch machine has functions that we could have otherwise only achieved with much greater design effort,” added Lamprecht, the Project Manager for the machine.

Greater process reliability

The Sigpack VPF with the Festo Motion Terminal allows pressure and vacuum measurement for process monitoring, leakage monitoring for checking for contamination of the valve, as well as individual adjustment of the cleaning and drainage pressure per lane. “The Festo Motion Terminal has given us a significant boost in terms of process reliability,” said Lamprecht.

To cover all these functions, only one piece of hardware is needed: the Festo Motion Terminal VTEM. It is the first device to use the revolutionary concept of digitized pneumatics in automation technology. Changes in pneumatic functions and adaptation to new formats are controlled via apps, by changing parameters. The integrated intelligent sensors for control, diagnostics, and self-learning eliminate the need for additional components, reduce complexity, and simplify the ordering process.

The apps of the Festo Motion Terminal can replace up to 50 individual components while machine operators receive status information for individual machines, entire lines, or processes in real time. Costly machine downtime can thus be avoided and machine availability can be increased.