Earlier this year, Matthews Intelligent Identification worked with Coca-Cola Amatil’s Northmead, NSW, plant to integrate coding equipment across its small PET bottle line.
The resulting streamlined production offers major cost and output benefits in a plant that runs 24/7.
Northmead plant’s manufacturing manager, Cameron Tully, says besides the financial benefit, two other valuable gains have been peace of mind and “noise” avoidance.
“What it means is that when we are running, we are getting it right first time.
It avoids the likelihood of product re-work, or even product write-off, just because of the wrong code being applied.
That is a major contributor in achieving manufacturing lean practice.
PET line
Using iDSnet, Matthews integrated some 8 Linx coders, which it had supplied earlier, linking them all back to a central PC control.
The IDSnet integration sees a single operator, from the central PC, selecting which products will be run just by pushing one button.
Information sent to the coders includes ink colour, and downloads to all the machines on that line.
“So in the case of Coke Zero, which needs a white code on the black lid, it tells only the white machines to run,” CCA’s site electrical engineer Peter Evans said.
“The software can also do a check between two coders to make sure they are running the same code. It also does check counts between the sensor and the print signal.”
The savings were immediate in potential human error and production uptime.
The software allows CCA to drill down on the health of each machine to detail previously unobtainable.
For instance, each encoder and sensor, on individual machines, can be checked for operability.
Monitoring depth also means operators can see what a single jet is doing from the control room, right down to how the ink is reacting on the machine.
Total integration
The Northmead site will run like this: when a truck pulls up, cans are automatically unloaded off the dock; the cans go right through the line, then the finished product will be picked up by an automatic guided vehicle, transported a few hundred metres to the end feed of an automated, high-bay warehouse, and stored.
A truck delivering for a major customer, such as Woolworth’s or Coles, can then pull up, and be loaded with pallets of product.
The IDSnet integration that has streamlined CCA’s small PET bottle line production activities will soon be extended to Northmead’s large PET bottle line and a new can line, including integrating fillers, right through to encompassing SSCC palletising labels.
This will be the first Coca-Cola plant in the southern hemisphere where product processing will not be touched by any human intervention.
www.matthews.com.au
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