Top loader handles multiple products

Associated Brands Industries, Ltd. (ABIL) is the leading manufacturer and distributor of snack foods, chocolate confections, biscuits and breakfast cereals in the Caribbean. ABIL was founded in 1974 and, over the years, has built up an extensive portfolio of brands. The company's headquarters and manufacturing facilities are located in Trinidad, West Indies, with distribution outlets in Jamaica, Barbados and St. Lucia. In total, the company currently distributes its products to more than 20 countries worldwide, reaching as far as Taiwan and Ireland. ABIL has been expanding progressively over the years, constantly adding new products to its lines. As part of this expansion and development, ABIL called on Sigpack Systems (pa.bosch.com/sigpacksystems/eng/index.asp) to improve efficiency at its San Juan plant in Trinidad by installing a robotic top-loader system to package a wide variety of products.

The new Sigpack Systems TTL-i top loader at ABIL packages 14 different product formats in seven different tray sizes. With such format variety, ABIL's main prerogative was to introduce a secondary packaging solution that simplifies and speeds up changeovers. With a compact footprint, he TTL-i combines three functions: tray forming, tray top-loading and tray closing. The intelligent robotic system on the TTL-i makes it possible to handle and top-load the trays in a compact footprint. All supply lines for vacuum, pneumatic and electrical sensors are integrated in a connecting plate, which holds the product gripper. This makes it very easy to change the gripper for a new product format, as the operator does not have to worry about the reconnection of additional cables and plugs.

The new top loader packages 14 different product formats in seven different tray sizes. All supply lines for vacuum, pneumatic and electrical sensors are integrated in a connecting plate, which holds the product gripper. This makes it very easy to change the gripper for a new product format, as the operator does not have to worry about the reconnection of additional cables and plugs.

For optimum ease of use and simplicity, changeparts are kept to a minimum. The tray-forming and closing tools are adjustable for the entire format range, so operators do not have to disassemble the machine for a format change, and it can all be done without tools. Sigpack Systems provided customer training, which enables the line operators to handle format changeovers without supervision. This saves both time and money and eliminates the need for highly skilled maintenance staff every time a format change is needed.

In moving away from manual secondary packaging, ABIL will also benefit on the logistics side by applying the new TTL-i. Initially, more than 14 different tray and blank sizes are necessary for the manual forming and loading of its wafer products. Sigpack Systems engineers studied all the product and packaging formats and then optimized the tray dimensions. As the TTL-i has the ability to top load products into very tight trays, a reduction in the number of tray sizes, from 14 to seven, will be possible. The printing of each tray format remains different, but the handling of fewer tray types will help to reduce the purchasing cost of the blanks.

With more than 100 years of experience and technical development in the field, Sigpack Systems was able to offer ABIL a solution specifically tailored for its application from system design, development and installation to training and after-sale support.