CASE PACKING

Machinery to collate a product into the desired formation and insert into a previously erected case.

The machines can be in various forms but the two most common designs are horizontal and vertical drop packers. The machines are basically product collators. The cases are pre-erected and either placed in position by hand or semi-automatically.

The horizontal type machine is quite common but cost is entirely dependent upon speed of product and type of collation.>

The standard machines are for reasonably "hard" stable products.

Some machines have been developed for products such as sachets and pouch products (e.g. potato chips). Two basic methods are used, one is to pick up a row of products either mechanically or by vacuum and place in the case, the operation is repeated until the required number is packed.

The alternative method, although not popular, is to drop in the produce from a moving conveyor so that the product is dropped into the case in layers.

These sachet machines are fairly slow as each row is picked up separately. Speeds of around 60 products per minute are possible on the machine placing the product or 100 per minute when dropped in the case.