Proco Machinery Inc., a manufacturer of automation systems for the blow molding industry, has unveiled the next generation of its Pakman case packer, which is integrated with Yaskawa Motomon HC10 and HC20 collaborative robots, intending for greater efficiency and automation for blow molded bottle manufacturing lines. According to Proco, these systems efficiently handle blow molded containers and can deliver a major cost reduction versus conventional automation. This latest iteration works interactively with co-workers and reportedly requires minimal training for teaching new tasks. 

“These systems are being designed in such a way that they complement the production line and provide simplified operation, a smaller footprint and enhanced efficiencies,” says Siva Krish, vice president of sales for Proco Machinery. “These collaborative robotic systems reduce the handling of the container and provide an excellent return on investment.”

Proco’s Pakman case packer features a collating indexing accumulation system to accumulate complete layers of bottles inside the packaging cell. The accumulation table stages the layer of bottles so they can be picked up by Proco’s end-of-arm (EOA) tooling and placed inside the box.

The accumulation indexing conveyor helps increase the line speed of the Pakman packaging cell since there will be one movement of the robot per layer.

PET containers — due to the high static of the heated bottles — tend to repel each other when they are close together. The layer pack EOAT technology ensures that containers are placed inside the box as a complete layer, thus preventing any change of bottle position. 

Another feature is Proco’s Integrated Rotary Inverting Technology, which helps to rotate a layer of bottles to neck-down orientation. Proco’s Pakman packaging cell has a new feature designed to help the processor pack bottles in an all neck-down orientation within a layer formation. As an add-on feature that can be purchased at a later date and fitted to the line, this feature does not change the packaging cell size.  

The Proco Pakman case packer is an integrated packaging module, which is supplied with a six-axis collaborative robotic arm, infeed conveyor and a box conveyor — all mounted onto a common sub-frame, which, in turn, is fitted with leveling pads and castor wheels. It can also be moved into position, set up and then quickly be in production. In addition, the systems are highly compact and can fit between the blow molding lines. Proco’s compact case packer also has a cell size of 100 in. x 70 in., and consists of the following features:

• Mobile cell with a safety door and interlocking 
• Integrated with Yaskawa HC10 or HC20 cobots 
• Integrated collating table for staging the bottles 
• Integrated container inverting mechanism 
• In-build secondary PLC with HMI for easy operator interface 
• In-build vacuum feature for polybag 
• Box alignment mechanism 
• Bottle infeed and exit conveyor 
• Box infeed and exit box conveyor

Visit procomachinery.com for more information.