The plastic packaging industry is as promising as it is demanding: to expand production or optimize existing processes and machines in order to meet price pressure as well as the quality and environmental requirements of international markets, regular investments need to be done. Trends and the expectations that contractors, competitors, and society place on the company have to be taken into account.

Only an experienced and independent partner who is familiar with the latest technologies and sees new possibilities for production processes and business activities can minimize risks and thus provide safe expansion and inventory optimizations as well as new business opportunities with customized solutions.

Unlike other providers, Rieckermann not only offers broad expertise on high-quality packaging machines but also provides full know-how on processes, local technical support in Asia and the Middle East and guarantees technical and economic project security. This makes your business safe.

To discover more about our plastic and converting industry solution, click here >

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PLASTIC & cONVERTING PROCESseS

FLEXIBLE PACKAGING SOLUTIONS VIDEO

RIGID PACKAGING SOLUTIONS VIDEO

MATERIAL HANDLING

Production processes are becoming progressively more challenging. Besides core plastic processes, the handling, conveying, mixing, and dosing of raw materials all need to be optimized and adapted to an increasingly complex manufacturing environment.

The optimized control of material distribution in existing and new factories can reduce errors and operating costs drastically. With smart concepts and perfectly dimensioned components, we provide individual solutions that address these issues and further stabilize the overall process.

Below are the case study for Material Handling:

A South-East Asian converting company with currently more than 100 injection molding machines and manual material distribution faced the usual difficulties of this kind of process setup, such as faulty material distribution, high level of required manpower and floor space as well as high traffic on site to distribute the individual raw material to the machines.

To grow their business and to improve its profitability, they planned to expand their production by building a new facility with more than 200 injection molding machines. With up to 100 additional machines and the large amount of plastic materials to be handled, the complexity of the whole production plant would actually increase, adding further sources of errors. Therefore, they planned to include a central material distribution system to address the above difficulties.

In view of the wide variety of materials with various mixtures and around 300 different colors used, outdoor silos also needed to be installed. Furthermore, the company needed a system capable of handling virgin and regrind materials as well as master batch. To make things even more complex, approx. 20% of the material used needed to be dried.

Only a customized system that fulfills all these stringent requirements would guarantee a safe upgrade of the production plant.

To ensure error-free material distribution for the facility, Rieckermann designed a tailor-made machine-based solution with central gravimetric mixing units and volumetric dosing units on each machine. The central gravimetric mixing units ensure that most of the material mixing takes place at a central location and not as in the current process at the dosing unit on top of the machines itself. The volumetric dosing units require lower investment than gravimetric ones.

This solution is quite unique on the market, and can easily be extended if the company should want to install additional injection molding machines in the future. The integrated system also includes the surveillance and control of the outdoor silos.

A stable production process, with continuous high quality, as well as the reduction of material losses and manpower are the main factors to be considered when developing a central material handling system. By installing the planned solution, the company would gain an automated, faultless material distribution process with a clean and safe production environment, and a minimum of required floor space for raw material beside the machines.

Additionally, the solution helps the company to reduce energy and manpower costs, leading to greater profitability.

Looking to future growth and investment, another major benefit from this individually tailored system with its central gravimetric mixing units is the reduction of investment costs required for a planned expansion. As the central gravimetric mixing units are already capable of handling 30% higher throughput, the volumetric dosing units could simply be added to each injection molding machine without further gravimetric dosing units being required. This results in a lower investment compared to gravimetric dosing units on each machine.

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INDUSTRIAL CHILLERS

Production processes are becoming progressively more challenging. Besides core plastic processes, the handling, conveying, mixing, and dosing of raw materials all need to be optimized and adapted to an increasingly complex manufacturing environment.

The optimized control of material distribution in existing and new factories can reduce errors and operating costs drastically. With smart concepts and perfectly dimensioned components, we provide individual solutions that address these issues and further stabilize the overall process.

Below are the case study for Industrial Chillers:

An Asian plastic converting company, which specializes in sheet extrusion and thermoform machines producing cups, lids and trays for coffee houses, and ready meals, were using open cooling towers to chill their running machines. This equipment requires an initially low investment, but also entails high operating costs owing to water evaporation, energy consumption and the usage of additional chemicals. As a result, the company was losing out on profits in view of the low throughput and rising energy costs.

Because of the inefficient system installed, the company’s facility had not enough cooling capacity to run their extruders at maximum capacity, leading to an unstable process and a low throughput. In addition, the existing process required added chemicals. These are known to have a negative environmental impact and also increase operational costs.

To improve the profitability of the business, the aim was to design a closed loop system – one that would run smoothly without the need of additional chemicals and save energy.

Rieckermann had conducted a feasibility study for the company, which forecast that the installation of a new central process cooling system would provide the company with a quick return on investment (ROI). These results persuaded the company to go ahead with an investment in high-quality European equipment that would offer them potential annual savings of 50% as compared with their existing system.

Rieckermann’s central process cooling system, including air cooled chillers outside and temperature control units at individual machines, was easily linked in with the existing process without causing any lengthy disruption to daily production activities. The system did not require any additional space, and parts of the system could connect to the facility’s existing pipes. The installed system can also be extended should there be any plans for future expansion.

Although a higher investment was needed for Rieckermann’s solution (compared to a solution that uses water cooling towers), it offered a quick ROI period of around 2.25 years and boosts profits considering its 50% reduction of energy costs annually. Thus, the converting company could benefit from lower running costs for their installed base.

Thanks to more efficient cooling, which results in a higher throughput and a stable process, the company can now operate their machines at higher speed. They also do not need to spend money on the additional chemicals that were required by the old system, and can save up to 98% of water using the closed loop system with an improved green footprint.

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PLASTIC RECYCLING

Many countries have shown a growing interest in the impact of plastic on the environment, as millions of tons of plastic waste are accumulating in landfills and polluting our oceans. The minimization of plastic waste and reuse of plastic materials is currently an important topic around the world.

To be successful in the plastic recycling industry in the long term, recyclers today must not only recycle with maximum efficiency, they must also meet strict requirements – especially when it comes to recycled plastic for food packaging.

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80 Service Engineers spread throughout South East Asia

56 Service Engineers spread throughout Far East Asia

6 Service Engineers spread throughout the Middle East

3 Service Engineers spread throughout Europe

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