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Sandwich Filler & Dips Labelling Systems

ALTech have recently installed a 3rd and 4th inline watchstrap labelling system into Freshpak, a leading manufacturer of dips and fresh sandwich fillings based in Barnsley, South Yorkshire.

Freshpak supply a huge range of sandwich fillings for grocery multiples, high-street retailers and food service outlets and have invested heavily in their filling and depositing equipment. Whilst their original machines were initially specified to label up to 120 pots p/min, they have now increased their line speed to around 200 products p/min, likely to be the fastest production line for this type of product in the UK. In fact, at the point of install of machines 3 & 4, the total count on one of the original machines (installed in December 2011) had recorded 51,000,000 label applications in just 45 months.

All of Freshpak’s ALTech systems are located in a chilled packaging environment, and despite these fairly arduous conditions and the near continuous operation, have required minimal maintenance over the years with very few worn parts, owed largely to their extremely robust ALline mechanical structure.

Freshpak label a wide variety of pot sizes with both paper and acetate labels. Labels are initially applied ‘flagged’ on the product and leading off their wide edge; therefore, increasing runtime capacity with more labels per roll. The labels are then momentarily held by an air assist, before being adapted down the side of the pot via our innovative high speed rotary adaption system; a system which features its own touch screen display and operation control functionality which is fully synchronised to the main machine.

Another particularly innovative feature of two of the four machines is that Freshpak have the ability to dynamically add a promotional label to the main body label before it’s applied. This allows them to place the label in positions on the final product where otherwise would not be accessible. The systems also include mounted Domino CIJ coder units for date/batch code information, which is easily achieved via the present coder start signal standard with all our machines.

These machines have directly replaced a competitor’s solution which used a combination of pneumatic and plough fold mechanisms to adapt the label. Freshpak’s site manager commented that the key benefit of their ALTech systems are the “straightness” of the labels in combination with the speed of the rotary adaption system – designed to remove drag back on the labels; a problem which occurred with their previous solution resulting in the reworking of up to 50% of products coming off the line. With their ALTech solutions there is virtually none, providing obvious efficiency and quality benefits.

Proven modular print and apply label application solutions for any barcode identification/traceability requirement.

Contact ALTech UK to discuss your requirements with our experienced and knowledgeable team.

More than 30 years established as a leading manufacturer of labelling machinery with a world wide install base.

Contact ALTech UK to discuss your requirements with our experienced and knowledgeable team.

We tailor design every labelling system to the exact requirements of our customers, ensuring they fully meet their needs.

Contact ALTech UK to discuss your requirements with our experienced and knowledgeable team.