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Packaging Profile: Ring Container Technologies optimizes packaging and packing through end-of-line robotic palletizing

Ring Container Technologies (Ring), one of the largest plastic container manufacturers in North America, continually improves its product quality and environmental footprint by innovating proprietary container technologies that reduce food waste, minimize material and energy usage, improve container strength, and support full product recyclability.

By Jim McMahon

Using the latest 3D-modeling software and manufacturing technologies, Ring, a privately held, multinational corporation headquartered in Oakland, TN, achieves the lightest plastic containers in the industry for consumer products such as peanut butter and condiments, without compromising package performance. The company's engineers utilize only the latest injection and blow molders available to create its industry-leading TRIMLITE™ products and provide its customers with a competitive edge in PET.

Ring's proprietary wheel blow mold machines improve efficiency, increase output, reduce maintenance, and shorten changeover times. These advantages have propelled Ring to become a leader in HDPE markets.

Advanced protocols like the company's commission, qualification, and verification (CQV) process guide the successful launch of every new product. For ongoing improvement, vendor-based and customer-based improvement teams meet regularly to implement process enhancements.

To ensure speed to market and long-term marketplace success, Ring provides the highest level of technical support, from design concept through commercial implementation. Optimizing both the design and manufacturing process ensures that its customers' packages will perform exactly as specified. These help to realize a higher return on investment for its customers and a lower environmental impact on the planet.

Process flow
The plastic containers are manufactured at a rate of up to 500 per minute per injection or blow molding line. After the plastic containers are manufactured, they are conveyed to end-of-line robotic palletizing and stretch wrapping for subsequent shipping to customers for filling. Ring has 10 manufacturing lines in operation, each feeding downstream end-of-line robotic palletizing.

Realizing the full potential benefit of high-throughput production requires a material-handling system that can match both the speed of container manufacturing and the robotic palletizers, to keep production flowing and prevent bottlenecks from occurring. Ring had such a conveying system engineered and built by Brenton Engineering (Brenton), a globally recognized provider of automated packaging systems and integrated end-of-line solutions.

"The containers exit from blow molding and injection molding in a single conveyed stream, then they are separated out into multiple conveyor lanes where the containers are accumulated and evenly spaced," says Sam Weller, business segment manager, Robotics and Systems, with Brenton. "The multiple lanes absorb surge or gap irregularities in the production flow, and even the rate of product movement to provide a smooth flow into end-of-line robotic palletizing. Each manufacturing line has a dedicated system of accumulation conveyors covering approximately 6,000 square feet of floor space."

The use of multiple conveying lanes also enables accumulation of containers, continuing to accept products from upstream for a time, in the event of downstream interruption. Then, when the downstream system comes back up, the accumulated products can be released downstream. This permits upstream blow molding and injection molding machines to continue producing uninterrupted.

"Not all container types exit manufacturing at the same rate," adds Weller. "Efficient conveyor line balancing, such as what we have put into place at Ring, has proved critical to keeping high-throughput production running continuously."

Robotic palletizing
The containers are conveyed, via the multiple conveyor lines, to infeed forming tables designed to automatically collate and arrange the containers into precise positioning for robotic palletizing. The infeed forming tables vertically stack the containers into a tight formation to form a 40 x 48-in. or 44 x 56-in. unified pallet layer.

As with the upstream container manufacturing, conveying, and accumulation, the robotic palletizing is equally completely integrated with these upstream systems. Similarly, the technology used is innovative and supports sustainability.

All 10 robotic palletizing cells, one for each manufacturing line, as well as the automated infeed tables, were engineered and manufactured by Brenton and installed over a period of eight years -- the most recent being in 2020.

"Each robotic palletizing cell consists of two Brenton RP1000 Fanuc robotic palletizers working in unison," says Weller. "Much of the technology of Ring's robotic palletizing was involved in engineering the end-of-arm tooling (EOAT) used to pick up the stacked layers of containers and transport them to the pallet."

Full-layer robotic EOAT
"Brenton developed a unique MasterPal^® EOAT for Ring, essentially a cradle-and-place technology combining a rotary tool system with multiple servo-operated axes to produce tight layers of palletized product," says Weller. "The EOAT palletizes full layers at one time, up to 500 lb, with speeds capable of up to five full layers per minute."

Here is how the MasterPal EOAT process progresses:

1. The MasterPal tool lowers over the formed layer of containers on the infeed forming table to capture the product. The internal tool clamping cradles and stabilizes the containers within the formed layer.
2. The robot moves to slide the containers off the infeed forming table, while the floor of the MasterPal tool moves simultaneously underneath the containers until the formed layer of containers is completely captured within the MasterPal EOAT.
3. The robotic palletizer transitions to the pallet and lowers the captured layer of containers onto the pallet, and the floor of the EOAT retracts to release the containers on top of a paperboard slip sheet, forming the next layer on the pallet. Then the clamping system retracts, and the robot raises the tool above the pallet.
4. The robot then cycles back to the infeed forming table to accept the next layer. Concurrently, a second Fanuc robot places a slip sheet on top of the newly formed pallet layer.

Palletizing for efficiency and sustainability
Pallets are layered up to a maximum of 110-in. tall, and potentially up to as many as 20 layers with smaller-height containers. The pallets are topped off with a slip sheet and a 1-in.-thick plastic top frame. They are then banded and auto-stretch wrapped, and are ready to be loaded for shipping to a customer for filling.

"The palletizing machinery at Ring is designed to keep unit-load products safe and secure through storage and transportation," says Weller. "These robotic palletizers provide considerable improvements, including more options for customized pallet configurations, faster changeovers for different packaging runs, tighter and more cubically optimized pallet loads for reduced shipping costs, and less possibility for product damage."

When smoothly integrated with upstream end-of-line systems such as high-performance blow molding and injection molding, conveyor systems designed for accumulation and automated layer-forming infeed tables, and equipped with state-of-the-art EOAT such as MasterPal robotic palletizers, complete the design of a high-performance, system-wide solution to reduce labor hours and downtime, increase throughput, and support sustainability. Such a system is in place at Ring Container Technologies.

Learn more about Ring Container Technologies at www.ringcontainer.com.

Learn more about end-of-line system and component specialists Brenton Engineering at www.brentonengineering.com. Brenton is part of the ProMach Robotics & End of Line business line.

Published December 2021

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