Boxing 18,000 muffins per minute

High productivity, ease of use, compact footprint and accuracy for Livetech’s LTL-3F, which has entrusted logic and motion control solutions to Rockwell Automation. M.C.

For an American customer in New York, active in the bakery sector, the Italian company Livetech (Guarene, CN) has recently created a new machine called LTL-3F (Livetech Top Loader - 3Functions) for the boxing of 6 different muffin types (max. weight 250 g) packed in flow-pack and available in six different formats, which are inserted in two different types of boxes, with the same base and different heights.
Three robots, designed and manufactured by Livetech, form the box starting from a blank, picking up the product, positioning it in the box and closing it with a punched lid.
«The productivity of the LTL-3F is very high» explains Federico Scornaienchi, Livetech Area Manager. «The machine is able to box 300 muffins/min or 56 boxes/min and will work on two shifts».

 
Simplify with competence. «This is a highly automated machine, so the operator simply loads the blanks for forming the box» says Luciano Vacchetta, Livetech’s Electronic Department Manager. «We have created a very intuitive command interface, as requested by the customer, which could be easily used by personnel with a not particularly high technical preparation. The format change is automatically managed directly from the operator panel, without the need for retooling, thus reducing downtimes. We have also developed the box design together with the customer (considering the aspects related to marketing, Ed.), So that they could be realized with a highly automated Rockwell system».
The collaboration between Livetech and Rockwell has a ten-year history and, therefore, the choice is not accidental, «because - continues Vacchetta - the American company offers us the complete integration of logic, a simple interface and an active support in the design phase of the machine: knowing well the development software environment of Rockwell Automation, therefore, we have reduced the design time of the machine».
The Rockwell Automation architecture has then allowed to reduce the wiring and to build a compact machine that, thanks to the use of low-voltage motors and the ability of the robots to regenerate energy during the braking phase, also offers interesting energy savings for the final user.
«The test and validation phase was even simpler. Another advantage obtained: the possibility of connecting the machine to a remote maintenance system to identify possible system problems. And if it is true that choosing Rockwell Automation entails an initial cost that is sizeable both for the manufacturer and for the user - concludes Vacchetta - this also guarantees an excellent return on investment, thanks to the reliability of the products and the high level of after-sales technical assistance guaranteed in the whole world from Rockwell Automation».      

The automation of the cartoner
Livetech, a specialized manufacturer of automation systems ranging from solutions for product distribution, to primary and secondary packaging machines, to casting and dosing units for chocolate and creams, counts among its customers important multinationals in the food sector.
The new LTL-3F has been automated with Rockwell Automation logic and motion control solutions, as requested by the customer. The architecture, programmed in RSLogix 5000 software environment, is based on a CompactLogix 5380 controller, with 4 Mbyte memory and integrated motion on Ethernet / IP for the control of 20 axes, and Kinetix 5700 dual axis servo drives (two from 1, 6 kW, three from 3.2 kW, three from 5.4 kW and three from 15.9 kW) that manage the robots, the conveyor belt and the warehouses for flipping the blanks.
The Kinetix 5700 is equipped with 18 low-inertia Kinetix VP servomotors, which send real-time information on engine performance to the control system via a digital feedback device. In addition to the power supplies, the system is completed by two unmanaged Stratix 2000 switches (one 8-port and one 5-port), a PanelView Plus 7 graphical terminal and 16-channel 5069 Compact I/O modules.