July’s machine of the month is a labelling system designed on behalf of a chemical company specialising in the production of homecare detergents. The solution is integrated within the customer’s production filling line, following the filler-capper. A requirement of the machine was to label a number of varying bottle shapes and dimensions and as such, has been designed for easy changeover from one product type to another.
The system is based on ALTech’s ALline E labelling system, fitted with an infeed pre-orientation system and equipped with two opposing ALritma label heads. The integration of these components allows the system to label oval bottles with front and back labels, cylindrical bottles with wrap around labels and cylindrical bottles with the labels oriented to the handle. The solution also uses a sensor to locate the label in orientation with the bottle handle, ensuring label accuracy and consistency over the varying product types. Each component can be alternatively activated (depending on the specification of the product to be labelled) and is mounted on slides for a quick and repeatable changeover.
