LAMMA 2013: Pacepacker's award winning packaging on show

Recent winner of six industry awards for high value engineering, company strategy and export growth, visitors to Pacepacker’s LAMMA Stand 233, Hall 2 will see new vegetable packing technology, as well as bulk bagging and palletising turnkey equipment solutions already in use at many agricultural and animal feed packers including Preva, I’ Anson, Fred Hartley, and Walter Harrison’s.

Users of Pacepacker’s award winning technology include premium potato packer Preva Produce where a Pacepacker production line now bags and palletises ten 10-25kg sacks of potatoes per minute.

Historically Preva packed their potatoes manually via third party co-packers as explained by Managing Director Ian Anderson: “Outsourcing our packing operation was not only cost prohibitive but it provided inconsistent pack quality due to human error and didn’t give our business the flexibility and growth options that we desired. Understanding the quality and efficiency gains that could be made by bringing the packing in-house, we chose Pacepacker for their knowledge of automation, to design and manufacture a system which would provide a premium looking pack with very little waste. Their value for money line has made our new plant highly efficient.”

Preva’s automated line incorporates the Total Bag Control System (TBC) Pacepacker’s award winning machine which has assisted customers in overcoming several downfalls when packing and sealing heavy sacks including increasing productivity while achieving consistent pack presentation. Premier animal feed manufacturer, I’Anson Bros Ltd, has installed three TBC systems during their 30 year relationship with Pacepacker, as Chairman and fourth family generation owner Chris I’Anson explains: “As technology has advanced we have looked to Pacepacker to provide the very latest automated systems to meet our growing demand.”

With a FANUC strategic partnership spanning 15 years, Pacepacker has most recently installed three palletising FANUC robots within I’Anson.

These systems are now precisely stacking 50 bags of animal feed within the dimensions of a pallet. “Our old palletising system was only able to pack 40 bags due to height limitations; the final 10 would be stacked by hand. Pacepacker’s FANUC solution has overcome this limitation making the process not only more efficient but we are now meeting the container requirements for our products which are shipped to Australasia.” Adds Chris.

As a robotics systems integrator, Pacepacker launched a pre-owned Blu-Robot palletising system in 2011 which provided both automation-shy SME manufacturers and seasonal packers an economical alternative to first-user systems. The Blu-Robot, which typically incorporates a high quality FANUC robotic arm originating from the automotive industry and is approximately 35% of the way through its expected 100,000 operational hour lifespan, has been successfully installed within Walter Harrison’s. Pacepacker’s fully automated turnkey packing and palletising solution created a more flexible and versatile production operation for the wild bird feed packer – while ensuring costs are kept to a minimum.

“While we do provide fully turnkey lines much of our equipment can be retrofitted to existing lines to aid our customer’s expansion and growth strategies,” explains Paul Wilkinson, Pacepacker’s Business Development Manager, “as customers’ production requirements change during the lifespan of a machine, we look to offer upgrade options which provide a solution at the fraction of the cost of a new system.”

Fourth generation family farm Fred Hartley Estates upgraded their existing packing line with Pacepacker’s high-speed T24 sack placer and has since reported a 100% increase in their output – with the line now achieving a throughput of 20 tonnes of potatoes per hour.

“I am delighted with the system and feel that Pacepacker has filled a gap in the market; there are high speed machines that can handle hessian sacks, but the T24 is the only system that I’ve come across that can manage paper bags at high-speed,” comments owner Fred Hartley.

At this year’s LAMMA Show Pacepacker will debut the Fanuc M20 pick and place robot with Pacepacker prototype cradle gripper to handle flow pack products including onions and peppers. This new system picks up 10 flow packs per minute and stacks them in a wide variety of orientations into crates and trays.