PETpla.net Insider 03 / 2021

BOTTLING / FILLING PETplanet Insider Vol. 22 No. 03/21 www.petpla.net 32 Tempo Beverages invests in new PET line from KHS A block system for the future A trust lasting more than 35 years: KHS recently commissioned a new non-returnable PET line for Israeli beverage producer Tempo Beverages under very special circumstances – and in doing so combined its latest-generation stretch blow moulding technology with a fi ller for the very fi rst time. In Israel Tempo is literally on everyone’s lips: as the biggest pro- ducer of alcoholic beverages and the third-largest supplier of soft drinks the brand is known to almost the entire population of 9.1 million. There’s hardly a household in the country without a bottle of beer, water, juice or cola from Netanya in the refrigerator. In 1952 the story of growth and suc- cess began in the city on the Mediter- ranean between Tel Aviv and Haifa. At the start of the 1990s Tempo Bever- ages became PepsiCo’s sole bottler in Israel and Heineken’s exclusive sales partner. In 2005 40% of the company, which is also the biggest brewery in Israel, came under the ownership of the Heineken Group. And nine years ago the beverage producer was made a licensee of the French spirits group Pernod Ricard. Tempo now clocks up sales of about €375 million, 45% of this with non-alcoholic beverages. The recent joint venture centered on Line 12 in Netanya. This is where Tempo fi lls its own mineral water and primarily Pepsi products – sugar-free Pepsi Max in particular – into non- returnable PET bottles. The line has now been replaced in two phases of construction. The fi rst in 2017 focused on the packaging and palletising sec- tion, during which an Innopack Kisters TSP with an integrated handle applica- tor and an Innopal PB palletiser with a capacity of up to 32,000bph were installed. In 2020 it was then the turn of the fi lling section when the previ- ous 25-year-old mechanical KHS fi ller with a maximum output of 18,000bph and the old stretch blow moulder from a competitor made room for the latest technology KHS has to offer: a stretch blow moulder/ fi ller block equipped with an InnoPET Blomax Series V and a modular Inno fi ll PET DRV fi ller. An Innoket Neo roll-fed labeller and Inno- pro Paramix C blending system are also part of the line. Challenging climate plus limited space Besides the usual demands made of the quality, ef fi ciency and per- formance of a new fi lling line, there were further challenges to be met. “The new line wasn’t just supposed to enable us to fi ll up to 32,000 1.5 l bottles an hour with our carbonated products. A further requirement was that we could bottle at 20 °C using 9 g of CO 2 per liter,” states Haim Neori, electrical and process manager for Tempo. In view of the company’s prox- imity to the sea, high humidity levels and ambient summer temperatures of 30 to 35 °C, the products needed to be cooled for fi lling and then reheated to prevent condensation being formed in the packs. Another obstacle to be overcome was the restricted space: with a ceiling just four meters high, individual adjustments had to be made in order to accommodate the line and clean room air fi lters and to position the cap and preform infeed. What’s more, construction work in the limited area had to be reduced to an absolute minimum so as to keep inter- ruptions to operation as short as pos- sible. “KHS had the perfect remedy for each of these problems,” Neori states. With its new PET line from KHS Tempo again lives up to its role as a pioneer. The stretch blow moulder/ fi ller block is the very fi rst to combine a new-generation KHS stretch blow moulder with a KHS fi ller. Another new path was also trod – after some initial hesitation – in a totally different area. “For the customer the KHS label- ler was a fi rst,” says Michael Roche, head of Regional Center Middle East at KHS. “Despite a willingness to experiment, our contact at fi rst found it hard to abandon the old and embrace the new with this machine. By employ- ing all our powers of persuasion and quoting a number of successful reference projects, however, we were ultimately able to convince our client,” Roche claims happily. “In the end Haim was full of praise for the Innoket Neo – he was really enthusiastic about how easy it is to operate and how smoothly it runs.” The KHS labeller was a fi rst for Tempo; after initial hesitation to try something new, the company is now very pleased with its acquisition. FILLING