New technology for sealing and shrinking sleeve

New technology for sealing and shrinking sleeve

In packaging aesthetics, the requirement of beverage packaging is to enable consumers to see the contents of the package to clearly check the quality of the product, such as the color of the product, whether there is any precipitate. On the other hand, the attractive design can be presented to the consumer, and the data and promotion information of the packaged product can be displayed on the package as much as possible.

With the continuous development of packaging technology, all kinds of color packaging forms and materials are new. The label packaging is a popular and common packaging form in recent years. It not only reflects the unique shape of the packaging container, but also can print excellent and bright. Going back to the case, it has stood out in the products on the shelves and won the favor of consumers.

The sleeves that are closely attached to the outline of the packaging container have a good visual effect, but the production cost is high. In response to this, the German Krones AG has developed another cost-effective alternative - the "sealing shrink sleeve" technology.

Steam shrinking process

In fact, the “sealing shrink sleeve” is a combination of a Contiroll labeler, an ultraviolet hardened tunnel and a shrink tunnel. This technology will replace the shrink-sealed bottle sleeve labeling process used in the past, and it is special in that it uses a steam-shrink tunnel with a hot air tunnel for shrink packaging.

Film roll to container

The “Reel Sealing Sleeve Label” allows the steam tunnel to be matched with the newly developed stretched polyethylene material to achieve up to 22% shrinkage of the film onto the container. The specific process is the same as that of a typical Contiroll labeler. First, the film is wound from a reel onto a container, and the head and tail of the film are glued together using a UV-crosslinkable hot melt.

UV lamp hot melt

The packaging container is then transported into a 1 meter long tunnel where the UV lamp is activated and the hot melt is thermally dissolved to cross-link. The unique design of these UV lamps offers users a range of advantages.

Steam heat shrinkage

After the container is exposed to ultraviolet light, it will then enter the shrink tunnel. In the shrink tunnel, the film label will use the steam to achieve shrinkage and fit according to the shape of the bottle. The Shrinkmat steam tunnel is a newly developed component of Krones. Since the steam chamber is completely insulated, the loss of energy is kept as small as possible, and the operator is protected from injury from contact with hot parts.

Flexible module design

Another feature of the steam tunnel is its modular design, which provides an option for expanding existing tunnels and adding capacity to add capacity when needed. In addition, UV tunnels and steam-shrink tunnels can be directly integrated into the actual production line, or the existing equipment can be retrofitted in a bypass form, greatly increasing production flexibility.