PETpla.net Insider 06 / 2018

PREFORM PRODUCTION PET planet Insider Vol. 19 No. 06/18 www.petpla.net 35 The sum of little things In the middle of ‘Husky Land’ there is a company which has nicely positioned itself to meet the potential challenges of the future - Western Container Corporation. Accompanied by its Director of Engineering, Darrel Smith, we visited one of their plants in Tolleson, Arizona. Western Container is unique in the United States in that they run Netstal machines on nine of the eleven preform lines at this plant. Tour Sponsors: Interview with Western Container Corporation April 2, 2018 We met: Darrel Smith, Director of Engineering The Western Container Tolleson facility, located just outside the city of Phoenix, supplies 11 Coca-Cola bot- tling outlets within a 500-mile radius in several western states and produces around two billion preforms and 500 million bottles annually. Western Con- tainer is a model example of a com- pany that has successfully adapted to changes in technology, market condi- tions, and customer demands in order to meet its mission of “maximising value to our Coca-Cola bottler share- holders by providing lowest cost, high- est quality and service, and assurance of supply.” To meet the mission requirements on a daily basis, Darrel relies heav- ily on Swiss technology, utilising Otto Hofstetter as his primary tool supplier since 2016. Installed on a Netstal 5000 machine, an Otto Hofstetter mould gen- erates 500 million preforms per year. Darrel sees the mould’s operational lon- gevity as its major asset. He estimates 10 million shots for an Otto Hofstet- ter mould as opposed to the usual 6 million. The hot runner is capable of up to 6 million cycles which is about twice as long as other types. While the service life of the mould is remarkable, it is the extraordinary customer service that particularly impresses Darrel. The exceptional training that Otto Hofstet- ter provides to the Western Container maintenance teams allows them to perform any necessary maintenance in- house. This increased skill competency and autonomy improves performance, leads to higher levels of member engagement, and positively impacts the program’s ROI. The injection moulding machines, however, are only one piece of the continuous improvement process at Western Container. The Western team are continually looking at all areas where improvements can be made, and advances in automation technol- ogy make implementation a more viable business proposition than in past years. The plant currently uses automatic guided vehicles to move preforms within the plant, and other areas of material handling have been identified which would likely benefit from automation making the process safer, more efficient, and cost effec- tive. The plant layout is impressive and the movement of material extremely smooth. The design of the injection area allows overhead cranes to get to any part of the machines, which allows mould handling to be done smoothly, efficiently, and safely. The plant layout also allows the Netstal machinery with its overhead action to be perfectly posi- tioned. The fact that this machinery is more compact than its Husky counter- part with lateral draw-off enables more lines to fit next to one another. Preforms from the injection sys- tems are discharged into plastic fold- able boxes which are then transported via automatic guided vehicles to the storage area. A bin erecting robot automaticly assembles the flattened boxes ready for use. It is interesting that empty preform boxes that come straight from the blow moulding depart- ment are not collapsed down, but filled again straight away with preforms which saves time in folding and erect- ing boxes. The production process continues in the blow moulding process where two KHS Blowmax systems operate along- side two Series 2 Sidels. Both the Sidel and KHS lines use the same preforms for the same bottles. The control room, or Quality Assurance Centre as Darrel likes to call it, is situated in the heart of the plant where a large monitor shows camera shots of all the key parts of the facility. At the same time, machine operators have a wide range of quality instruments at their disposal on-site which are used to accurately check size, weight etc. and to make system improvements where necessary. A Zecchetti handling system col- lects the bottles and palletises them on reusable plastic pallets which are then loaded onto large American trucks; just one pallet can hold 3,168 bottles of 20oz. As Western Container prepares for the many challenges that the future will hold, they are well aware that it is the work of the whole plant as well as the corporate support staff that ultimately determines whether they will achieve their mission goals. Indeed, it is the sum of many little things. www.westerncontainercoke.com Darrel Smith, Director of Engineering, Western Container Cooperation, Tolleson, Arizona, standing in front of the 11 preform lines