TURNKEY SOLUTIONS


an accelerated discussion about alternative energy sources, requires a great deal of forward-looking planning – on the part of both the confectionery producer and the provider of the turnkey solution.” Digitalisation of processes, smart and user-friendly


automation, as well as solutions for predictive maintenance for all, consistent quality, transparency, and highest possible efficiency are all typical requirements for turnkey solutions today. “Depending on the region and the availability of trained staff, or even a turnkey solution can also include the hiring or training of a well co-ordinated operator team or even permanent in-plant service engineers,” says Günther. “Bühler runs a global network of Application and Training Centres that allows customers or teams to develop products or try solutions before staring production at their own factory. The operator teams can also attend customised training with Bühler’s process experts. “After handover of the keys, a long-term service agreement


will help ensure the factory continues to run smoothly – that the assets are managed and maintenance undertaken in a timely way to ensures that both and the lifecycle of the plant and solutions are maximised.”


Of course, the most important element of any turnkey


project will always be the final product that comes off the end of the line, but having a flexible and future-proofed setup, which is able to take into account relevant and changing market needs, will certainly help ensure that a turnkey solution pays for itself time and time again.


Cutting edge bespoke solution for artisan-style confectionery packaging Chris Rabago, Director of Manufacturing at Hawaiian


Hawaiian Host is a North American confectionery company which is believed to be the largest manufacturer of chocolate-covered macadamias in the World. Its products are often purchased as a souvenir or a gift, so the packaging has to reflect and support the company’s brand, the gift giver’s intentions and the receiver’s high expectations. Cama was asked to help develop a turnkey packaging


line to handle the demands of this particular packaging exercise – Naked chocolate products, three shapes, 15 packaging counts, 17 packaging formats, five SKU styles and throughputs of up to 1,500ppm! In operation, the solution sees robots equipped with


grippers used to pick naked chocolates from feed rows of a conveyor and placed into PET trays that arrive in parallel from a de-nester. The chocolates’ quality, shape and position on the belt are determined using a special 3D laser scanner. Once each tray is full, they are loaded singly or in pairs


(with a cushion sheet) into a carton tray, before a lid is formed and tucked into the tray – the finished product being a completed box containing anything from between four and 32 chocolates. The boxes are then fed through an X-ray machine and checkweigher before heading to a case packer at the end of the line. The line is also capable of bulk packaging – which can


be used as a fall back in case of any line issues. In this instance carton sheets can be fed through the line and delta robots can directly load chocolates into the carton. These are then passed onto a customer-specific manual loading section, an approach which helps prevent any significant downtimes.


Host, says: “Cama established confidence with our team by taking a collaborative approach on finding the best solutions. Clear communication and collaboration was essential, as equipment projects have a high number of variables, and it is critical that an open dialogue exists around cost/benefit solutions as well as build decisions that may impact the equipment capabilities in the future. We were looking for an intuitive user interface, simple changeovers, and remote service support, which is especially important to our Hawaii-based production facilities, as it is often a challenge to quickly bring technicians onsite.” The variables in this solution demand a digitalised


solution. “This line benefits from our full Industry 4.0 offering and is one of the first to deploy our new AI-driven line supervisor software,” explains Alessandro Rocca, Group Sales Director at Cama Group. “And to keep uptime to an absolute maximum, it exploits our ‘toolless’ RFID- managed changeover solution and an automated gripper system, both of which help deliver some of the fastest batch-swap routines in the industry.” The digitalised approach also makes operator training,


machine interactions and maintenance routines simpler, thanks to immersive augmented reality (AR). All operational parameters are collected, collated and disbursed using a centralised PC, which can share instructions and alarms to tablets. The PC also monitors energy consumption as part of a sustainability package, which is supported by the machines ability to handle and package trays made from sustainable materials.


KennedysConfection.com Kennedy’s Confection August/September 2023 61


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