January’s machine of the month is a flat sack feed & labelling system recently installed by ALTech into Trouw Nutrition (formerly Frank Wright), a leading supplier of nutritional products and services to the animal feed industry. Trouw Nutrition are labelling more than 7 million sacks per year and have come back to ALTech for a second ALfeed machine following the success of their first system provided 12 months ago.
This solution can handle a diverse range of bags, including paper and poly valve and pillow sacks, in a wide variety of sizes and surface finishes. The change in bag type requires virtually no setup as the hopper self-adjusts to the size of the bag and the pick and place lift system automatically adjusts to the thicknesses and length of bag. This self-regulation was crucial to Trouw Nutrition as they frequently complete short runs of batch labelling; one of the key reason why they don’t label inline filled sacks which ALTech also provide solutions for (see ‘Fosroc’ case study).
The machine operates at an average of around 30 bags p/min, with speeds approaching 40 bags p/min for the smaller bags. The complete handling system was built by our UK team with labelling heads tailor designed to the application supplied by our parent company. The print and apply ALcode vacuum belt labelling head integrates the latest Zebra ZE500 print engine. A versatile engine providing the opportunity to hot-swap the printer between machines; a feature Trouw Nutrition utilise with high dependency on the machine. The solution also integrates an ALritma labelling head to apply pre-printed hazard warning diamonds when required in the same product pass.
The machine is designed for single man operation, with multiple infeed hoppers and an intelligent outfeed collection conveyor allowing a single operative to feed and unload bags from a central position. The labour saving advantages of this solution have been of huge benefit to Trouw Nutrition as well as the consistent and accurate label application to their wide variety of bagged products.
Video showing a variety of bag types being labelled
Video showing poly bags being labelled
