China's beverage market in 2004 reached 24.49 million t, especially tea, fruit juice, functional drinks, high-speed growth continues to hot filling PET bottles to bring opportunities, if the 60% PET packaging and 1000ml PET bottle standard , At least there will be more than billions of PET bottles demand.
The beer, it is a technical research and consumer psychology problems. In addition to preservation, sterilization and other issues, consumers can accept plastic bottled beer is also a question to be verified. People expect to have 3.5% PET bottled beer in 2005. Obviously, this is a worthwhile attempt compared to 0.1% in 2002.
PET blowing technology
"The employment of those who believe that China's packaging machinery and pet bottle production, far from the development of drinks." In the field of blowing, China is currently the main development of two-step method, because the efficiency of two-step method is relatively high. From the blowing point of view, foreign countries have reached more than 50,000 bottles per hour, or even more than 70,000 bottles, China has just 25000 bottles.
Sidel's Asia Pacific president, Mr. Zhang Zhong, believes that the world's one-step market is declining, the two-step process is growing, there are two main reasons: First, the current preform can be bought, Commercialization is very common; one-step growth is a factor that is in many places there is no way to find a suitable preform, and now because of the mass production of preforms, customers can easily get the embryo without their own production The The second is that the two-step method has advantages over cost in terms of cost and quality. In the bottle blowing market, the cost of the bottle is extremely sensitive to the characteristics of the two crucial factors determine the return on investment: the machine's production capacity and the production of each blowing station. Sidel's "double-mold cavity" concept (in the same mold out of the dual-mode cavity), in the same station at the same time blowing two bottles, very suitable for single-size small container production. Sidel's SB020 second-generation dual-cavity equipment can reach 60,000 bottles / h.
Mr. OlafWeiland, Managing Director of SIGCorpoplast, believes that "every manufacturer in the future will produce its own container in its own factory." Obviously from the economic benefits, transport empty bottles to filling the plant will increase the cost. Now the production of the beverage industry is from blowing, filling to packaging through-train, improve the efficiency of the whole line. Two-step method has the characteristics of light weight, simple operation, flexible production and so on. It can directly use the preform without considering the PET raw material and so on, concentrates on the finished product filling and so on. China Director Mr. Chen Jun Tian introduced SIGCorpoplast blow molding machine, the replacement mold time is short, each cavity per hour output can reach 1630 bottles, the speed is very fast.
Krones' ContiformH40 stretch blow molding machine can be used to produce thermoformed bottles and standard bottles. The production of 500ml bottles is 44,000 bottles / h, suitable for hot-filling PET bottles.
Green leaves on the root of the affection
The cap is a detail that is often overlooked by the consumer, but it is a big problem for the vendor. Mr. Li Keping, of Italy, has been studying the caps and cap molds for many years. "The production of plastic caps looks very simple, but the manufacture of plastic cap molds has a high degree of expertise." Jie Feite company to design and manufacture multi-cavity, high precision, hot runner injection mold known. In 2000, Jetway developed a 64-chamber rapid prototyping cap mold and achieved a 3s opening and closing on the Nestal fast injection molding machine, creating a world record of the 64-chamber cap mold opening and closing cycle.
"Many of the European plastic cap manufacturers are looking to ensure that the bottle cap physical function, to minimize the cap weight, improve productivity, in order to reduce costs to increase market share." Jetway company in line with market demand, developed MIVA Series caps. MIWAL3P, for example, 28mm, only 1.5 ~ 1.6g, than the traditional PET bottle plastic caps light 1g, this bottle as long as 90 ° can be rotated to open, open the torque is low, young and old appropriate. At present, there are 7 sets of Jetta special company to provide this 64-cavity cap mold used in the Wahaha Group. Jetway has also invented a patented technology for non-rotating twin injection molds for disposable production with gasket caps. This invention greatly saves the investment in the production of equipment with pad caps. The traditional production of the bottle cap is made by injection molding cap equipment, injection molding or drip liner equipment and assembly equipment. With Jetway's double injection mold, it is easy to add an injection unit to the original injection machine The realization of the production with a bottle cap.
Sarkami SACMI's squeeze cap is another technology that, unlike traditional injection caps, is the first mechanical manufacturer to bring the plastic cover to the market. Sage meters rotary hydraulic press makes the mold simplistic, so the cost of investment required for compression molding is much less than the cost of injection molding. As Sarkami at the same time completely self-designed and manufactured plastic cover mold, it has a greater overall advantage. According to Sakemi's introduction, this pressing bottle cap is very suitable for the production of round cap. Sarkami in July ProPak exhibited 600 / min cover machine, but their fastest product reached 1200 / min, there are already seven of this product sold.
Injection and compression caps represent two different processes, the former can buy a variety of molds, flexible design, you can design a relatively complex lid, but the higher cost of the mold; and press the cap is relatively low cost.
Gabriel Bericap is a professional family of German companies, under the 18 companies, in 2003 sales of 310 million euros. Kunshan company in China was established in 1998, mainly in China to provide 30/25 and PCO28 bottle mouth cap, 38mm, 48mm and five gallons of TamperEvident cap. As well as functional caps (such as bottled water anti-theft cover). Which produced about 900 million 30mm caps for China's "non-carbonated drinks" industry. The current "Bai Li cover service package" is a new package with the user to study the form, has been far beyond the standard cap design. For example, in the 38mm hot filling area, the SK38 / 16DoubleSeal hot filling cap is the ideal solution for efficient filling of large equipment.
Challenge the ubiquitous air
PET bottles with good transparency, chemical stability, good barrier performance, light and cheap and recyclable advantages, but there are three kinds of PET bottles need to block the packaging: First, O2-sensitive fruit juice and dairy products and vials Of the carbonated drinks; the second is CO2-containing products; third is both O2-sensitive and CO2-containing products, such as beer. As a beer bottle, PET bottle barrier has been a severe test, beer packaging is the highest requirements of all beverages. This is the 2002 global 250 billion beer containers in less than 0.1% of the reasons for the use of PET bottles.
First, the compressive strength, can prevent high pressure under the exudation of CO2 and the infiltration of O2 outside; followed by heat intensity, to be able to withstand the high temperature of pasteurization; the third is the impact resistance. Improve the barrier function of PET bottles become the main direction of the major companies, which involves raw materials, equipment, processing technology and PET modification.
At present, the barrier technology is mainly reflected in several aspects: the first is the surface coating method, such as Sidel's Actis technology, the use of amorphous carbon coating, oxygen than ordinary PET bottle effect increased by 30 times the cost is only 78% of glass bottles, 65% of metal cans, in the recycling has a clear advantage. Its Actis20 plasma coating machine can handle 10,000 0.6L PET bottles per hour. Sidel in 2001 in China to promote Actis coating technology, but at that time China and even the world's PET bottles in the beer market is clearly overestimated the popularity. But today has been different, born in the late 1970s, young people are almost containing, holding, carrying PET bottles grow up, the recognition has been greatly improved; and Actis coated PET bottles in the very picky Germany The beer market has received a high degree of acceptance of customers and consumer goods. Mr. Paul Holmerith, executive vice president of Sidel Group, believes that the opportunity to promote in China has come, but Sidel will look for partners to promote, China's beverage industry has many innovative pioneer companies, so the win-win space is very large The Mr. Arne Andersen, manager of Plasmax Coating Equipment at SIGCorpoplast, told reporters that the Plasmax coating plant produced PET filling bottles using the "plasma-activated chemical vaporization and sedimentation" (PIVCD) technology. This plasma technique uses two gas blends, igniting the gas to produce a chemical reaction in the inner wall of the PET bottle coated with a layer of SiO2. This coating is completely transparent and does not change the color of the original PET bottle. The coating can be cleaned with chemicals and completely recovered. As the coating is inorganic, it does not react with the product, thus ensuring safety. According to Andersen, the coated PET bottles increase by about $ 100 per 1000 bottles compared to the uncoated cost; however, if the coating is selected, the thickness of the PET bottle wall can be reduced and the weight of the bottle can be reduced, thereby reducing the cost of the bottle The Plasmax12D coated bottles and systems, various sizes (0.4 ~ 1L) PET bottle coating speed of 10,000 bottles / h.
The use of vacuum plasma enhanced chemical meteorology deposition technology has been from the Japanese company's strong support. This diamond-type carbon treatment process DLC, mainly by the Japanese-day love ASB ASB, Japan's Kirin beer, Mitsubishi Corporation and other companies to develop. This coated DLC film PET bottle on the O2 barrier performance than ordinary PET bottles increased by 20 times the CO2 increased by 7 times. Transparency is very high, the coating is soft, easy to crack, strong acid and alkali resistance. Is currently developing the corresponding production equipment, and to the Chinese market.
And the barrier silicone coating by the Coca-Cola Company and the German company Krones KRONES and other companies to develop a "barrier to the management of silicon-treated PET bottles," the cost of the process than the use of PEN bottles or multi-layer coating bottle more economical. But this coating may make the outer layer of PET bottles filled with needle-like holes; Switzerland Tetra Pak TetraPak company also developed in the PET bottle plasma coating SiO2 technology, the formation of the inner wall of the bottle thickness of 0.1 ~ 0.2mm glass-like coating Layer, with this bottle canned beer, shelf life can be extended to 4 to 12 months. Can handle 18,000 0.2 ~ 2L beer bottles per hour.
Other coating technologies such as Italy's Zippa SIPA company using the United States PPG's epoxy-amine barrier coating, the production of epoxy-amine coated PET bottles, the formation of bright scratch-resistant barrier; Tetra Dow DOW Chemical's thermoplastic ring resin, with two bottles to adjust the thickness of the barrier layer; DuPont DuPont company is also developing two coating technology, the O2 and CO2 barrier can be increased to 30 times.
In addition to spraying barrier technology, the mixed material modification method with multi-layer co-extrusion technology, the market development is also very fast. In the PET bottle by adding other substances, such as PEN, LCP, MAX6, etc., to form a new plastic packaging materials. This method has material blending modification, copolymerization modification, multi-layer compound modification and nano-PET plastic (NPET).
Dare to innovate in Zhuhai Zhongfu Industrial Group is the leading PET bottle production company, is the first to obtain Coke recognized PET bottle manufacturers. They use multi-layer compound modification, the use of Kortec company's multi-layer co-injection process made of PET bottles, can withstand 67 ℃ high temperature, beer shelf life can reach 6 months; Canada's HUSKY company for the production of barrier The method of the multi-layer bottle of the bottle, the barrier layer of the gas is made by coextrusion blow molding and final embryo separation.
Krones' BestPET barrier coating can be used to handle single-layer PET bottles with a capacity of 20,000 bottles / h for industrial applications in beer, fruit juice, tea drinks, soft drinks and perfume containers.
Filling competition
2001 market revolution to unify the "fresh orange" hot filling PET bottles of juice drinks opened the curtain; and Huiyuan in order to regain the leading position in the juice beverage market, the introduction of PET aseptic cold filling line, the processing capacity of more than 1 million t, in one fell swoop to reverse the decline, which "he + her" with excellent marketing, 4 months of sales reached the forefront.
PET bottles aseptic cold filling technology, can reduce the weight of PET bottles and reduce costs, but the cost of sterile PET equipment investment is very high, the cost of a line in more than 1000 million euros, but also for the plant's environmental health requirements Very high Domestic filling processing machinery about 200, with the whole, complete sets of production capacity of less than 30. Filling the highest domestic only 36000 bottles / h, while foreign countries have reached more than 70,000 bottles / h. Domestic basically to hot filling line, only Lehui and other limited manufacturers to provide cold filling line technology. When the price of PET particles is gentle, coupled with heat-resistant PET bottles of mold design and equipment technology to enhance, can further reduce the weight, the aseptic filling empty bottle cost advantage gradually disappear. West of the company's Mr. Meijun told reporters that the real test is from the milk of tea drinks (such as milk tea, coffee milk, etc.), these production lines must be sterile PET bottle filling line.
Mature beer market is declining, out of the trough is the key to promote product quality and breakthrough packaging means. SIG-Simonazzi develops a new brewery process to achieve the long-term stability of the quality of PET bottled beer, that is, enhanced pressure cold sterilization EPT, is in the high-speed state (according to the pressure gradient) has been filling a good plastic bottled beer using high pressure Water treatment and semi-adiabatic rapid heat treatment combined with the way to sterilization. This EPT process is characterized by the already brewed beer products, directly applied to the product and packaging materials (bottles and lids), thus eliminating the filling process of secondary pollution.
Guangzhou Lehui company's Mr. Chi Zongbo that can fully learn from the advantages of foreign cold filling, the development of China's national conditions for the aseptic cold filling line. Such as sterilization machine using Krones Krones model, China's air quality is poor, in the bottle of the blow molding, transport process prone to secondary pollution, Krones mode can effectively sterilize the inner and outer walls of the bottle; washing machine should use KHS Of the three-channel mode, making the adjustment is convenient, if the disinfectant sterilization is not completely in the bottle machine plus a disinfectant sterilization; in the filling valve structure selection PROCOMAC model
