PETpla.net Insider 05 / 2016

PRODUCTS 40 PET planet insider Vol. 17 No. 05/16 www.petpla.net Minting the base Mint-Tec is a new technology to press the preform base into optimum shape for the subsequent blowing process. The effect is a reduced wall thickness of the preform base while the base surface is increased. As the warmest spot of a preform after injection moulding is the base, very little force is needed to bring the base into optimum shape. The special minting device shapes the conical or spherical base of the preform directly after injection moulding in the first heat. The Mint-Tec unit is designed to use the reheating effect directly after moulding to decrease the base wall thickness and increase the outer surface of the preform by means of a gentle, but fast minting process. At the end of the shaping process the preform is in contact with the cooling sleeve where cooling takes place very rapidly thanks to the reduced wall thickness and the increased outer shape. Main advantages of the Mint-Tec preforms are the lower wall thickness in the bottle base which leads to a faster cycle time of the blow moulding machine and the total PET bottle weight savings by 3-5%. www.mint-tec.com Block configuration featuring three machines The trend towards combining several units to form a single machine continues unbroken. In the shape of the 3Bloc, Krones’ subsidiary Kosme has presented its first concept for a block configuration featuring three machines available in two different variants: one for PET and one for HDPE containers. 3Bloc for PET containers consists of the three concatenated machines: the blow-moulding machine, the filler and the labeller. The labeller is constructed either for applying pressure-sensitive labels or for reel-fed wrap-around labelling. This configuration is suitable both for cylindrical or square PET bottles and for special-shaped containers. The maximum output is 16,000bph. The 3Bloc for HDPE containers consists of the following three concatenated machines: The unscram- bler, filler and the labeller. The unscrambler is tasked with putting the already-blow-moulded HDPE bottles in an upright position before they reach the filler and here takes the place of the blow-moulder needed for PET containers. This 3Bloc variant can handle up to 25,000bph. It concept has been based on technically sturdy components, and when compared to a layout featuring individual machines scores in terms of its substantially lower energy consumption, its efficiency and its enhanced user-friendliness. The block configuration benefits the machine’s footprint, plus the capital investment and oper- ating costs involved. For example, no intermediate conveyors are needed and the times required for format change-overs and maintenance routines are also shorter. www.krones.com PET bottle for pasteurised beer PET Engineering, the international com- pany for the design and industrialisation o f PET packag i ng received the prestig- ious 2016 Packag- ing Oscar - Quality Design-category, at the headquarters of the Corriere della Sera in Milan, Italy. The win- ning packaging solu- tions were selected based on the ten prin- ciples of the Packag- ing Ethics Chart for a responsible, bal- anced, safe, accessi- ble, straightforward, informative, contemporary, visionary, educational and sustainable packaging; a packaging that combines, on the one hand, practical functions such as preservation, protection, transport, accessibility and easy disposal, and on the other, its communication functions, transforming it into a tangible product capable of establish- ing a connection with the consumer. “9.3”, the 500ml PET bottle for pasteurised beer presented by PET Engineering, was designed according to such criteria. “9.3” stood out for its light weight, 26.3g compared to approximately 27.0g for a glass half-litre bottle for its material, which keeps the bottle safe and unaltered from high temperatures during the pasteurisation cycle, and for its Pelliconi pull-off cap, which not only facilitates the opening process, but also the disposal of the whole packaging in the plastic waste, since its label is also made of the same material. www.petengineering.com