In the latest issue of International Plastics News - Middle East and Africa, we got the chance to feature an expert in blow moulding - Bekum's CEO, Andreas Kandt. Bekum has been monitoring technological advances and dynamic market trends.
The centrepiece
of Bekum’s interpack 2014 exhibit was the fully-electric EBLOW machine
generation. The electric drive concept is very popular with manufacturers of
plastic packaging due to its efficiency.
In addition to the clear benefits of the machine technology, extrusion
blow moulding also meets the current trends in the packaging sector. These include greater demands on design,
extended service life, as well as rising demands for turnkey systems and
resource conservation as part of the expanding sustainability goals of
manufacturers.
Plastic packaging and containers can be
economically produced on the single- and double-station blow moulding machines
of the electric EBLOW and hydraulic HYBLOW series from Bekum. Bottles and containers with capacities of
between 3 ml and 20 litres can be manufactured, depending on the machine
type. This makes an output rate of more
than 100 million containers possible per year, depending on the size. Modern production technologies, such as the
“tandem blow” method, which enables simultaneous blowing from top and bottom
from one extruding parison, are ideal for producing packaging of up to 330ml at
very high volumes, such as for drinkable yoghurt and Actimel® bottles. The
“tandem blow” method not only enables 100% higher output compared with
conventional production processes, it
can also reduce the weight of the bottles by optimising the production of the
system technology from Berlin. This
results in substantial savings on material compared to the usual standard market
weights. This is an impressive
contribution toward conserving resources and improving sustainable production
of hollow packaging.
The extrusion low moulding method is
proving increasingly popular with packaging processors due to its
“geometricproduct versatility”, compared with stretch-blown products, for
example. This design is beneficial in the retail pharmacy or food sectors as an
option for getting certain packaging models onto the shelf very quickly.
"Blow moulding also offers a degree of freedom or versatility for when
packaging needs to be presented attractively on the shelf to promote
sales" states Mr. Kandt.
Packaging with built-in protective
barriers, which are intended to prevent diffusion from the outside to the
inside or vice-versa, can be produced with coextrusion technology. Food or
pharmaceutical products need to be protected from oxidative reactions as much
as possible. This means that the higher
the quality of the packaging equipped with barrier technology, the longer the
shelf life will be. A long shelf life
(use by date) is a good selling point for consumers, as it facilitates stocking
and tends to reduce the waste rates for food in retail and for the end
users. With
Bekum, this logic can be applied to food or retail pharmacy packaging, but
especially to pharmaceutical packaging.
“If valuable contents need to be protected, coextrusion blow moulding
technology offers many options, which ‘traditional’ packaging is not able to
provide”, adds Mr. Kandt
Read the full article, "Shaping the world of blowmoulding technology"
