The blowing-filling-capping combiblock is often written in English as Blowing-Filling-Capping Combiblock (Newamstar) or Blowing-Filling-Capping Combi Block (Newamstar). Its main components and working process are as follows.
Infrared heating system and heat balance adjustment device
A stable infrared heating system and an independent heat balance adjustment device keep preform heating temperature consistent. This improves process consistency and stability and increases the yield rate.
Secondary blowing system
The specially designed secondary blowing system monitors the pressure curve of each mold cavity in real time during bottle forming. It provides timely and accurate real-time parameters for process adjustment, making it easier for operators to adjust process parameters and helping ensure stable bottle forming quality.
High-speed, high-precision diaphragm filling valve
The filling valve has a return gas channel independent of the liquid cylinder. During filling, the air displaced from the PET bottle does not enter the liquid cylinder, avoiding secondary contamination. The valve is equipped with a cleaning cup for online CIP cleaning. We can machine precision parts such as filling valves, valve cavity components, and cleaning cups according to customer drawings. Hansheng Automation machines to drawings, with materials and surface treatments selected for the actual working conditions.
Sanitary washable capping machine
The capping machine uses a kinematically optimized cam surface design to minimize impact force. The bottle bottom support plate of the outfeed star wheel uses a spiral descending method, so changing bottle shapes does not require adjusting the height of the outfeed conveyor chain.
Working process and environmental isolation
Preforms are blown into empty bottles by the blow molding machine and transferred to the filling machine through a robot and transition wheels. The blow molding machine and filling machine have different working environments and can interfere with each other. Filling is a wet zone and requires a lower working temperature. Blowing requires a dry environment and is a heat source zone. The blow molding machine and filling machine therefore need effective separation. A transition chamber is set up, with only bottle inlet and outlet gaps left in the area, and the area is kept as enclosed as possible. FFU clean positive pressure airflow at the top blocks air and prevents water vapor and hot air from flowing between zones.
Bottle bottom cooling
After empty bottles leave the transition chamber, they are transferred to the filling main machine through several transition star wheels. During this transfer, the bottle bottom must be cooled to ensure subsequent filling quality. Bottles from the blow molding machine have a relatively high temperature. When filling carbonated beverages, the liquid temperature is low and the carbon dioxide has just been mixed and is unstable. The bottle bottom temperature must be reduced from 60 to 70 °C to 40 to 50 °C to prevent bottle heat from affecting the filling material and causing foaming. Spray cooling nozzles are installed below the transfer star wheel from blowing to filling, using external water sprayed onto the bottle bottom for cooling. The number of nozzles depends on filling speed and bottle arrangement. Tests show that a cooling time of 5 seconds is needed to achieve the effect. The actual cooling zone is designed for no less than 8 seconds so it can handle bottles with different bottom weights and shapes. The nozzle design provides a large cooling surface. High-efficiency spray nozzles can greatly reduce water consumption. Depending on customer choice, cooling water can be circulated to save energy and reduce emissions.
Filling valve
When cooled empty bottles enter the filling main machine, the filling valve starts to work. The filling valve is the most important core component of the filling machine. We give priority to recommending electromagnetic flowmeter electronic valves to customers. Traditional mechanical isobaric filling valves and electromagnetic flowmeter electronic isobaric filling valves are basically similar in filling process. The difference is that mechanical valves use actuators to perform various filling actions according to installed position points, while electronic valves use electrical programs to automatically control actions in time sequence. When equipment running speed changes, the electronic valve can still automatically execute the set action time to maintain a constant filling state, ensuring filling quality and precision. Compared with mechanical valves, electronic valves rely on precise control and reliable execution and better meet the design requirements of high quality, high efficiency, low consumption, and intensive operation. The newly developed filling valve from Newamstar has made major breakthroughs in structure and function.
The lift cylinder and valve are designed as one unit. The structure is simple and easy to clean. The structure without a separate lift cylinder reduces maintenance cost and improves equipment reliability. In addition to carbonated beverages, the valve is also suitable for filling mineral water and juice beverages.
The valve can select filling modes according to the material, using slow first, then fast, and finally slow. This helps control precision, supports stable material filling, prevents foaming, and can increase filling temperature to achieve room-temperature filling of carbonated beverages, saving energy.
The electronic valve uses a unique spiral downward filling valve method. The filling material is evenly filled along the bottle wall, which helps control CO2 mixed into the material, keeps the filling process gentle with less foaming, and is especially suitable for easily foaming, high-temperature carbonated beverages. The valve cavity back-cleaning function opens a bypass during cleaning, increasing the cleaning channel path. This solves the problem that small exhaust cavities are difficult to flush with CIP cleaning force and enhances cleaning effect. Each filling head is equipped with a cleaning cup. Customers can choose manual or automatic cleaning cup installation according to their needs.
To further ensure filling quality, the inlet, back pressure, and exhaust outside the filling main machine all use PID adjustment for stable control. In particular, pressure holding after exhaust cavities are centralized helps control exhaust stability and is especially suitable for filling carbonated beverages at higher temperatures.
Capping machine
After bottles are filled, they are transferred to the capping machine through star wheels. The capping machine design is suitable for different caps. According to the needs of carbonated beverage caps or drinking water caps, the top differential DC motor can be adjusted directly on the touch screen to precisely adjust the number of capping turns for different caps. In addition to conventional disinfectant spraying, cap handling can also include a medium-pressure ultraviolet sterilization device or an ion air purge device on the cap drop guide rail according to customer configuration needs, meeting diverse cap handling requirements.
Quick-change and control system
In actual production, market conditions often require one line to change between multiple beverage bottle models, from 250 mL to 2.5 L. A quick-change structure is therefore necessary. The new quick-change structure for change parts can shorten working time by nearly half and greatly improve production efficiency.
The equipment also uses a large number of solenoid valves and diaphragm valves, which places higher requirements on mechanical and electrical supporting systems. The integrated control system and Newamstar online inspection system combine optics, mechanics, electricity, gas, and liquid technologies. They integrate integrated control and image recognition technology and use servo systems for synchronous control. This enables integrated control and production of multiple unit devices, meets the production needs of multiple beverages, and achieves multiple uses for one machine. It supports scientific production line layout, seamless connection, integrated control, lower investment cost, lower energy consumption, and lower equipment maintenance cost.
Beyond parts for the blowing-filling-capping combiblock, our custom precision parts machining capability also serves several industries. Hansheng Automation can machine yacht precision parts, RC car precision parts, printing machinery parts, and medical device parts to drawings, as well as non-standard parts for tobacco packaging machinery and filling machinery. We machine to drawings with attention to dimensional consistency and delivery responsiveness.
