GEA is presenting a new sealing system for its vertical food packaging machines for the frozen food market at IFFA in Frankfurt. It utilises special metal bands that reduce waste and increase productivity.
In the new GEA Smart Sealing System, metal tapes are used instead of the Teflon tapes previously used in the sealing area, which greatly reduces the need to change the belt. This has many advantages: It maximises productivity, reduces downtime, lowers the total cost of ownership (TCO) and improves packaging quality.
The GEA Smart Sealing System was developed for tubular and gusseted bags for packaging frozen vegetables, fruit, potato products, meat, meat alternatives, fish and seafood. The new sealing system is suitable for PE monomaterials as well as for all common composite materials, including recyclable material structures such as BOPE, MDOPE, PP laminates and paper laminates.
In the past, the heated sealing jaws of conventional sealing systems on vertical packaging machines were usually protected with Teflon tape to prevent sticking when processing PE film. As a precautionary measure, the tape was replaced at the end of every 8-hour shift, with spare sealing jaws being used after around 40,000 bags during the changeover. The new system has metal belts with a PFAS-free coating (i.e. without polyfluoroalkyl substances). With this system, up to one million pouches can be reliably sealed before the sealing strips need to be changed.
The reduced downtimes thanks to the Smart Sealing System and the reduced need for skilled labour increase the profitability of the machine. It currently takes around 5 minutes to replace the Teflon tape when using spare sealing jaws. For most applications, this corresponds to a loss of 400 packaging units over the course of an 8-hour shift. With the Smart Sealing System the packer can run almost continuously, which prevents production downtimes.
In addition, GEA Smart Sealing ensures Integrated detection of product in the seal for a more reliable closure of the bag. This eliminates open packaging and at the same time prevents the bag from sealing when food is in the sealing area.
Leaky packaging is now a thing of the past, as is damage to the film knife, which is used to separate the individual bags after sealing. This no longer comes into contact with contamination from product in the sealing area. Tests have shown that up to one million bags can also be processed with the knives without replacement. The result is lower costs and higher productivity.
With the Smart Sealing System GEA additionally increases the sealing pressure and shortens the cooling time of the seal in each cycle. This Increases throughput speed and boosts machine output by 20 per cent. All in all, both the overall system efficiency and the durability of the seal and packaging quality are increased.
Source: GEA
GEA at the IFFA: Hall 8, Stand G20
