PET preforms | packaging
Profi table preform production means running moulding equipment at the highest levels of effi ciency. Chris Smith looks at the latest innovations in mono and multi- layer production
Preform system developers target process effi ciency
High volume manufacturing means running equipment at the highest levels of effi ciency and using the minimum amount of material, labour and energy. PET preform production is no exception and the focus of development from the key system suppliers to the sector such as Husky, Sipa and Netstal – as well as newcomer Milacron – is on building production systems that deliver the maximum return on investment. The newest preform production system from Husky Injection Molding Systems – the HyPET HPP5 – is the latest development of the company’s preform moulding technology and an example of the company’s continual optimisation of its processing technology. “We continue to make signifi cant investments to better understand the production issues our customers face so that we can offer new technologies to respond to these challenges,” says Husky vice president of engineering and business development Robert Domodossola. “With our latest innovations we have paid particular attention to improving availability.” Husky is the leading player in PET preform moulding
systems with an estimated market share of more than 80% (the company does not disclose market data). Since the introduction at the end of 2013 of the HyPET HPP5 preform system, the company has taken orders for more than 70 systems, 40 of which are already in full
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production. At the NPE show in the US last month the company showed the latest refi nement of the system – introducing a reduced mould maintenance package incorporating self-cleaning. It was demonstrated on a 400 tonne HyPET HPP5 system with a 96-cavity mould producing a 10.89g preform for a 500ml CSD bottle running a 5.5s cycle.
The cost of cleaning “To keep quality high you need to do some cleaning or vents will eventually get clogged. And these are essential because you need venting to fi ll the cavity,” says Nicolas Rivollet, Husky director of business development. He says a machine running a sub-6s cycle would typically require around 100 cleaning cycles each year to ensure good preform quality is maintained (volatiles are a by-product of plasticising and contribute to build up of PET and additive dust in the vents which slows air escape and leads to poor fi ll in the neck area of the preform). With a traditional dry ice cleaning routine taking around 4 hours to complete, Rivollet says this equates to some 400 hours of downtime annually – or around 5% of available system production time. Husky’s self-cleaning routine is essentially a
precisely regulated fl ashing process. “The stack is designed in such a way that we create controlled gaps
April 2015 | INJECTION WORLD 15
Main image: Husky has added mould alignment and self-cleaning
capabilities to its HyPET HPP5 preform moulding
systems, shown in a 48-cavity HPP 300 version
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