More and more automatic on folder gluer machine

In the early years, the market proposed greater capacity, better product quality, faster speed and higher work efficiency for the packaging industry. When a goal is completed, the period of harmony between the market and the industry is very short because new goals will appear in an instant. The packaging industry, especially the supplier of folder gluer machine, ZHANTIAN has always been fighting against difficulties to provide customers with the best service and the most ideal products. Suppliers in the intelligent industry are also making unremitting efforts to prepare for the coming challenge.

ZHANTIAN CEO has communicated with leaders in the automation industry for many times to discuss how to accept this visual challenge and fight a beautiful revolutionary war. The leader of the intelligent industry said that the company would be willing to cooperate with the packaging industry to complete this technical innovation and jointly open a new era of science and technology. ZHANTIAN is grateful to Bruce, from ISA (https://www.isa.org); Route in Germany from automation technology company ; and Chi from IBM for their viewpoint.

Challenges ahead

The challenge recognized by insiders is that customers constantly require shortening the mechanical production cycle and compressing the delivery time to the extreme. “In the face of this thorny difficulty,” said Mr. Huang, director of the production department of ZHANTIAN MACHINERY, “we can only constantly optimize the production process and increase the proportion of intelligence”. To give a simple and understandable example, we will replace the original lathe technology with laser cutting technology. For the same batch of accessories, it takes 3 days for the lathe to complete, and only 2 days for laser cutting (including back and forth transportation). In this batch of parts, we saved 1 day. If each batch of spare parts can save a little time, together they can greatly shorten the production time. This sounds like a good solution, but it has a fatal disadvantage, that is, a large increase in production costs. The cost of laser cutting process is nearly twice that of lathe. The so-called wool comes from the sheep. The customer group will pay for this expense.

He proposed a solution. “Many experienced factories have been leading factories in the industry for five to six years, or even eight to nine years,” he said. “They plan to introduce intelligence into mechanical equipment and reduce manual labor. In some developed countries, the cost of manual labor is far higher than that of mechanical intelligence.” I quite agree with the above point of view. I agree that mechanical intelligence is an indispensable way for the development of machinery. In addition to the cost, there is also a thorny problem in the introduction of intelligent technology, which is the shortage of suppliers of intelligent technology. China’s intelligent technology belongs to the initial stage. The system stability of R&D is insufficient, the production cycle is long, and the price is high. The use of overseas intelligent systems requires high costs and imperfect after-sales services.

Recognized difficult challenges

The technical worker of Heidelberg, Luyiat, is a front-line technical worker of printing machinery with more than 10 years of experience. He said that the technology and software facilities equipped on their machines can design and formulate a perfect working line to achieve the maximum production capacity and the best quality in the shortest time.

However, the correlation between different machines is not strong. It may take a long time for products from the printing machine to enter the die-cutting machine. The connection between the two is not very harmonious, which wastes a lot of time and lengthens the production time in disguised form. If we can find a good way to seamlessly connect the work of various equipment, the work efficiency will be greatly improved and the production capacity will be doubled soon.

ZHANTIAN CEO put forward a unique view: enterprises should improve the follow-up mechanical equipment of folder gluer machine to improve the efficiency of the entire production chain. The existing box gluing machine adopts the manual box receiving method. This method relies on manpower and is not friendly to some countries with small populations. ZHANTIAN’s independently developed and produced box collecting machine can make up for this deficiency. Place the collection machine at the end of the carton folding gluing machine, namely the end of the conveyor. The two are connected by a synchronous induction wheel. The cartons coming out of the pressing part will automatically enter the box collection machine. If an automatic packer is connected later, this link can eliminate manual labor and achieve full automation.

If we want to shorten the connection time of each link, we must start with every detail. Further study whether there is still something that can be optimized between each link, and optimize one by one to shorten the time. Bobst, the leader of the pasting machine industry, pointed out that only by shortening the industrial chain can the interests be maximized. Each device shall be marked with an exclusive code mark to prosecute the source manufacturer. For example, drug kits, each of which has a specific traceability code. If the customer has a demand, he can always appeal to the source manufacturer and communicate with them about the problems encountered. This greatly shortens the distance between customers and merchants, and provides fast and high-quality services.

The previous equipment did not support software systems, and the production was purely dependent on hardware facilities. To some extent, this situation has caused inconvenience to the update iteration of the machine. The engineer must first upgrade the hardware equipment of the machine, then add the software system, and finally complete the entire upgrade process. Taking die-cutting machine as an example, our company has added human-computer interactive touch screen. PCL is the brain and main control center of the die-cutting machine. Its embedded program can reduce 40% of the manual workload and ensure that the machine works in an efficient manner. PLC also has memory function. Manually enter the task number and working parameters. After receiving the instruction, PLC will adjust the machine to the best working specification and state. This function greatly reduces the time and effort of manually adjusting equipment. For products with task numbers entered, even unskilled employees can work smoothly. This greatly reduces the dependence on technicians.

In addition to the memory function mentioned above, the device also adds the debug function. Take the carton folding gluing machine as an example. In addition to its own work, the carton pasting machine also needs to detect whether there are problems such as missed printing, printing color difference or indentation line not being pressed well. If any defective product is found, the removal part equipped on the pasting machine will remove it. This function improves the product quality and saves the trouble of manual review. To a certain extent, it saves labor. Originally, the factory would set up a quality inspector to inspect the qualification rate of products. Now thanks to this function, the factory can reduce some expenses. The PLC will record the action of the rejection part and calculate the percent of pass.

The shortage of technical personnel is a thorny problem for all walks of life, especially the machinery industry. In 2019, a sudden virus spread wantonly on the earth, killing and injuring millions of people. The disaster caused a sharp decrease in the number of technicians. 90% of the technicians are from rural areas, and they go to big cities to make a living. The epidemic made them realize the importance of their families. Therefore, they returned to their hometown one after another to reunite with their families and find a stable job to make a living in their hometown. The higher the degree of automation of machinery, the lowest technical requirements for users. All they want to do is to press the key and wait for the finished product. Such high requirements urge machinery manufacturers to continuously optimize their equipment. The only drawback is that the production cost of highly automated equipment must be higher than that of ordinary mechanical equipment. As the water goes up, so does the price of machinery. There is no such thing as a free lunch. Every price and every product depends on whether consumers are willing to pay for their high requirements.

The engineers will upgrade the outdated system to make it have more humanized logic and meet the needs of users. The upgraded touch screen interface clearly shows the machine operation parameters and finished product count. The new system uses three-dimensional graphics to display data more clearly and simply. Users only need to click to complete the operation. If it is necessary to spray some glue, and then touch the spray point glue pattern; If linear gluing is required, touch the linear gluing pattern. The operation is very simple. Any beginner with zero basic knowledge can learn to operate easily and quickly. Take the cold glue spraying system as an example. In addition to setting the shape, you can also set the glue amount, line length, and the direct spacing of glue points.

Users clearly know how the machine they operate is the best running state. The operator will record the operation data, which can be used for evaluation during monthly monitoring. There are protective measures on the system, and passwords are added to the core operation data. The core data is set by the manufacturer when leaving the factory, which ensures the normal operation of all links of the machine. If it is accidentally modified during use, the machine will not operate normally. Therefore, the system has added a password, which can only be modified by the manufacturer’s personnel. The safety of the machine has been further improved.

A large number of system software has been put into use, which makes the machine more and more automatic. This undoubtedly injected a positive force into the market. This is the main reason why we are willing to invest a lot of money and energy to develop new systems. The service life of the machine is getting longer and longer, while the time required for installation and operation is getting shorter and shorter. This is the goal that ZHANTIAN MACHINERY has always adhered to.