Today, machinery construction OEMs are facing special challenges: Rapid format changes, versatility, security, flexibility and availability are becoming increasingly important in today’s packaging industry. This is partly due to the market’s need to adapt swiftly to the changing tastes of the consumer, and partly to the need to combine different packaging production processes on the same machine and get the most out of these investments. The good news is that these goals are easy to achieve with the right servo drives and motion control systems.
While you may want to retain the basic design of the machines, new-generation machines need a compact footprint. Servos can provide a much higher torque-to-volume ratio than other technologies. Servos also are available in a wide variety of sizes, making the processes around machines easier and faster. Servo drives like SINAMICS S210 and electronic motion controllers like the SIMATIC 1500T from Siemens enable very simple format changeovers, in part due to automatically calculated electronic cam discs for the current packaging format. However, electronic motion control is also the basis for greater precision in the packaging procedure. This enables automation of processes that were previously manual. The electronically synchronized servo drives ensure an optimized dynamic response in every movement phase and provide extremely high repeat accuracy of machine movements. This results in a high level of process safety with stable throughput and fewer rejects.