Design a Layout for Your Production Floor for Added Efficiency

When businesses begin to look at packaging machinery, the most likely reason is an increase in production demand that makes it difficult to meet goals without some type of automation. While the speeds of the individual machines are always taken in to account by packagers looking to get more done every day, there are other ways to make a packaging line more efficient as well.

While a mathematical equation can be used in most cases to figure out exactly how many bottles could be rinsed, filled, capped or otherwise packaged in a set amount of time, these equations simply do not take in to account all of the aspects of running a line. For example, automatic packaging equipment will require the loading of bulk product, bottles, caps, labels and other items. Simply planning the storage and location of these items on the production floor can increase the efficiency of the line as a whole. Having empty bottles near the beginning of the line can cut down on the transfer and loading depending on the method used for any given system.

On the other end of the line, finished product will need to be prepared for shipping to customers, retailers and the like. Again, efficiency can be added to the entire process if the end of packaging line is located near the shipping area. Cutting time off of the transfer of product from the end of the line to the pallets, trucks or other mode of transport being prepared.

While some lines may be able to run in a straight line from beginning to end and achieve an efficient flow, this is not always the case, nor is it a necessity. Curved conveyor sections, transfer turntables and other design techniques can be used to allow bottles or other containers to flow in whatever manner needed to get the most out of the equipment and the production process as a whole. For this reason, LPS Packaging Specialists will often prepare line layouts for a packager as well as visit a production site if the project is complicated or the packager would like on-site suggestions for the design of the entire line.

So while it will always be important to know that a particular piece of packaging equipment, such as a liquid filler or a capping machine, will complete a certain amount of bottles per minute, it is just as important to know that such efficiency will not be lost in the other areas of the packaging process as a whole. To discuss your own project with a Packaging Specialist, contact the Liquid Packaging Solutions offices today.