IMDvista: Bottle inspection system including calibrated measurements
During recent years, IMD engineers were designing new lighting techniques, algorithms and hardware to improve their bottle inspection system IMDvista Boco Scan. Market research was performed to understand the requirements of potential customers; hundreds of types of bottles were collected and thousands of hours of R&D were logged studying these bottles. The first major challenge was the ability to inspect multiple different types of bottles using the same system; transparent, natural, opaque, shiny, flat smooth and structured. Each of these types of bottles require different lighting and camera techniques to achieve optimal inspection results.
For example, a customer may run a clear PET bottle and a white shiny PET bottle on the same line. Traditionally this would require two completely different designs of hardware configurations; backlighting for clear and front lighting for opaque as well as different camera angles due to the clear bottles. The shiny white bottles would cause multiple lighting reflections causing a limited side inspection for contamination, scratches or burn marks. The Boco Scan has the capability of inspecting all of these bottles within a compact single module. Using four special high-resolution cameras (12.5 megapixels) and proprietary lighting configuration even the most complex bottle designs are now capable of inspection.
Additionally, using Artificial Intelligence (AI) the system can learn and easily distinguish a good bottle from a defective bottle. Most bottles have some natural defects to them especially extruded bottles. These defects do not affect the integrity or performance of the bottle. Recognising the difference between natural process driven bottle marks and actual defects is alleviated with the use of A.I., as the Boco Scan gets smarter over time. This is especially useful with bottle with strong structural features.
The second major challenge was the ability to perform accurate measurements on the finish. IMD took on the challenge to introduce lab quality measurements in an automated online inspection system. By implementing telecentric camera, telecentric lighting and new algorithms, the result are a fully calibrated measurement system capable of measuring to an accuracy of +/- 5 µm (T/E) on 100% of the bottles.
Through the IMDvista Portal Software, these measurements can be saved and exported directly to quality management systems. To guarantee sucurity, the system includes a state-of-the-art vein scanner. This hardware features uses an infrared sensor to “scan” the blood veins in the operators hand as this method is more secure than traditional methods of fingerprints or RFID tags.
Complete inspection solution
To round out the system additional inspections are available:
- Thin wall inspection and material flow 360°
- IR control for monitoring of heat profile – prevention of deformation after cooling of the bottle
- Base control – panel inspection
- Parting line (also in the handle area)
- Neck inside inspection (choked necks)
- Thread inspection
