A few years ago, automation technology only accounted for 30% of packaging machinery design, but now it accounts for more than 50%, with a large use of microcomputer design and mechatronics integration control. The automation design of packaging machinery has the following two main characteristics:

**Each robotic arm is controlled by a separate computer, and a packaging machine needs multiple robotic arms to complete complex packaging actions. When completing the packaging action, under the capture and monitoring of information by a computer-controlled camera, the robotic arm completes the specified action according to the instructions of the computer program to ensure the quality of the packaging.

**Has high resolution capability for materials and thickness. During the packaging process, the thickness and material changes of packaging materials are not easily distinguishable by the human eye, so computer-controlled cameras and detectors are often used in the design of packaging machinery to distinguish the thickness and material changes of packaging materials. Cameras have now developed the ability to self examine and distinguish captured images, and display them on a screen. At present, the speed of the machine cannot be changed during processing; In the future, the speed should be adjusted according to the changes in materials, so as to control the work in an optimized state, complete the packaging process in a short time, and achieve automatic cleaning, disinfection, and cleaning.

Seeking ways to increase efficiency and reduce process costs

German packaging machinery, especially beverage and beer filling machinery and food packaging machinery, has the characteristics of high speed, complete sets, high degree of automation, and good reliability. Its beverage filling speed is as high as 1200 bottles/hour, and its cigarette packaging is 12000 cigarettes/minute. Increasing machine speed is a complex issue, the faster the speed, the lower the unit cost, but the larger the usable area of the factory building. In addition, the speed of the electric motor is also limited, so it cannot be as fast as you want. Generally speaking, increasing the speed by 15% to 20% will bring about a series of complex problems.

In addition to increasing the rotational speed, solutions can also be found through other channels to improve the rate:

One is to adopt continuous or multi head working mode. The working modes of packaging machinery include intermittent and continuous. When designing, efforts should be made to design for continuous operation, which can improve the efficiency; A device can also have multiple lines, the same product or several different products, but * * to improve reliability.

The second is to reduce the scrap rate and provide a fault analysis system. The losses caused by waste are enormous, not only in terms of product loss, but also in terms of material loss. Therefore, it is necessary to significantly reduce the scrap rate as much as possible; When selling packaging machinery, a fault analysis system should also be provided for maintenance services, that is, modal analysis should be conducted to find faults, or remote diagnosis should be carried out through the Inter network to meet customer needs to the fullest extent. In the future, packaging machinery should be further intelligentized, that is, the equipment should search for faults and solve them on its own, in order to reduce the scrap rate and failure rate, and improve the normal rate.

The third is to integrate product machinery and packaging machinery. Many products are packaged immediately after completion, which is also beneficial for improving product yield. For example, chocolate equipment and packaging equipment in Germany are controlled by a single system. The key to integrating the two is to solve the problem of matching each other in terms of efficiency, among which packaging machinery often becomes a bottleneck, so it is necessary to provide equipment with different rates.

Adapting to changes in the packaging market, emphasizing equipment flexibility and agility

Many packaging products have shorter replacement cycles to adapt to fierce market competition. For example, cosmetics change every three years or even every quarter, and the quantity is large. Therefore, packaging machinery is required to have good flexibility and adaptability, so that the service life of packaging machinery is much longer than the product's service life, in order to meet the requirements of economy.

In order to make packaging machinery have good flexibility and agility, and improve the degree of automation, it is necessary to extensively adopt microcomputer technology, module technology, and unit combination forms. To adapt to changes in the variety and type of packaging products, the flexibility and adaptability of packaging machinery and equipment are often manifested in the following three aspects:

The flexibility of quantity. It can package individual products as well as adapt to packaging of different batches of products.

Flexibility in construction. The entire device is composed of units, and by replacing one or several units, it can adapt to changes in the product.

Flexibility of supply. Using unit combinations, supply each unit together. Like a candy packaging machine, by combining different units, three feeding ports, and four different folding packaging forms on a common basis, one machine can simultaneously package 8-10 different candies. Operated by multiple robotic arms and monitored by a camera, the actions are directed to package different types of candies in different ways according to instructions. If the product changes, simply modify the program inside the camera to make the device more flexible and adaptable.

Provide complete sets of equipment based on user needs

The packaging machinery design in Germany is based on user needs, providing structural and economically complete system solutions for enterprises, and demonstrating the operation to users through computer simulation technology. After soliciting user opinions, modifications are made. When providing automatic or assembly line equipment to users, special attention is paid to the integrity of the complete set of equipment, whether it is high-tech, high value-added equipment, or relatively simple equipment, they are provided according to the requirements of compatibility.

German packaging machinery manufacturers will also provide complete sets of equipment as their goal. Like a beverage filling line, there are over 200 microcomputer components, many pipelines, display screens, and more than 100 software programs that control various packaging actions. To meet the rate of 1200 bottles per hour, two lines need to work together, so the entire beverage filling line needs to occupy half of a football field and all equipment must be from one manufacturer. When it comes to China, one of the major weaknesses of current packaging machinery is the high number of single machines, automatic laminating machines, and a lack of complete assembly lines; There are many main engines, few auxiliary engines, and poor compatibility. Germany's approach is worth learning from.

Using computer simulation technology to shorten the mechanical development and design cycle

With the continuous acceleration of new product development, computer simulation technology is widely used in German packaging machinery design, which stores various machine elements in a database on the computer, digitizes the drawings and inputs them into the computer, and the computer can automatically synthesize them into a three-dimensional model. Then input the actual data and indicators, input various possible faults, and the computer 3D model can simulate the real working situation for operation, demonstrating the achievable rate, the amount of waste, whether each link of the line can be matched, and where the bottleneck is, so that customers can easily understand the curve displayed on the screen and modify the model according to their opinions. The computer synthesis speed is very fast, so the modification work is quick and convenient until the customer or designer is satisfied. By adopting computer simulation design technology, the development and design cycle of packaging machinery has been greatly shortened.

The design of packaging machinery should not only focus on its functionality and efficiency, but also on its economy. However, economy is not solely the cost of the mechanical equipment itself, but more importantly, the operating cost, as equipment depreciation only accounts for 6% to 8% of the cost, and the rest is the operating cost.