{"id":69995,"date":"2022-10-12T12:45:57","date_gmt":"2022-10-12T10:45:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/packaging-journal.de\/?p=69995"},"modified":"2022-10-12T13:33:00","modified_gmt":"2022-10-12T11:33:00","slug":"abb-automates-packaging-process-at-bifi","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/packaging-journal.de\/en\/abb-automatisiert-verpackungsprozess-bei-bifi\/","title":{"rendered":"ABB automates packaging process at BiFi"},"content":{"rendered":"
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ABB has automated what used to be done by hand for Jack Link's. The popular BiFi snack is automatically sorted and packaged using ABB delta robots, because after the confectionery industry, the meat industry is also working on automating production and packaging processes.<\/strong><\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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Until the turn of the millennium, many sorting processes in the meat industry were still carried out by hand. At BiFi manufacturer Jack Link's, employees were still manually sorting BiFi sausages on the line and placing them in the trays of the thermoforming machine in the early 2000s. The commissioning of the robotic sorting system in 2006 marked a foray of automation into new hygienic application areas<\/strong> represent.<\/p>

How can BiFi sausages be automatically gripped and packaged as efficiently as possible? With this in mind, the then young company Robomotion was commissioned to design a suitable robot cell for the BiFi packaging system. At the time, the Stuttgart-based start-up with its three founders Steffen Mayer, Jan Binder and Dr Andreas Wolf was working on the integration of robots into series machines in the meat industry. It soon became clear that the technological principle, Grasp products quickly according to specific criteria using image processing, control technology, sensors and sophisticated gripper technology<\/strong>, was also of great interest for applications in the food industry.<\/p>

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As part of a co-operation ABB<\/a> The company provided the startup with an IRB 340 FlexPicker delta robot. Due to their parallel kinematics, robots of this type are ideal for Suitable for handling tasks with high demands on speed and precision<\/strong>, for example, from a conveyor belt into a packaging machine. With the ABB robots as the centrepiece, Robomotion was tasked with developing and validating a robot system in its role as system integrator. Preliminary tests in the laboratory demonstrated that the ABB robots were capable of reliably feeding up to 150 BiFi sausages per minute into the thermoforming packaging process using mechanical grippers. ABB in turn assumed responsibility for servicing and maintaining the robot system during operation.<\/p><\/div><\/div><\/div>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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Following a successful test phase, a total of four IRB 340 FlexPickers from ABB were installed in the first system. With the help of the connected feeding technology, the BiFi sausages are Robomotion vibration sections and distributed by four FlexPickers for sealing into the moulds in the prepared thermoforming film<\/strong>. Cameras installed along the conveyor line not only check the quality, but also analyse the position of the sausages.<\/p>