Industry 4.0?

The term indicates a trend of industrial automation that integrates some new production technologies to improve working conditions, create new business models and increase productivity and production quality of the plants. Industry 4.0 passes through the concept of smart factory:

• Smart production: new production technologies that create collaboration between all the elements in the production: collaboration between operator, machines and tools.
• Smart service: all the “IT infrastructures” and techniques that enable systems to be integrated; but also all the structures that allow, in a collaborative way, to integrate the companies (supplier – customer) between them and with the external structures (roads, hubs, waste management, etc.).
• Smart energy: keep a keen eye on energy consumption, creating more performing systems and reducing energy waste according to the paradigms of sustainable energy.

What EFFE3ti does

The mandatory fundamental points, used by Effe3Ti, which define the machine for the Industry 4.0 certification are five:

• Machine control through PLC;
• Connection between the machine and the internal IT system of the company;
• Automatic integration with warehouse management system and / or with other machines in the production cycle;
• User friendly interfaces;
• Compliance with all the current regulations on safety, health and hygiene at work.

And more:

• Remote maintenance and remote diagnostics systems;
• Continuous monitoring system and archiving of product-specific data.

Effe3Ti has developed machines and automatic lines following these criteria even before they were grouped and defined within Industry 4.0 and this is why it is favorably ready and at the forefront in the search for solutions.

The strong point is to design, build and manage tailor-made packaging machines as close as possible to the production, logistic and telematic requirements.

In the foreground the study of the product and the stability checks after wrapping: less film used for a more ecological environment; high stability of the wrapped product for safer pallet transport.

We define the Effe3Ti machines built to the Customer’s idea, always supported by a team of technical experts to define the most suitable specific criteria.

Film specifications, wrapping details, tension applied to the stretch film, pre-stretch percentage, center of gravity, weight, product identification, number of coils used are only few of the information the Effe3Ti certified machines can provide to the IT systems.

Any examples?

Some automatic lines designed for Industry 4.0 have been produced and installed:

• An automatic winding line built for the fruit industry, delicate products that need to be wrapped without producing condensation inside the packaging. Hence the use of macro-perforated film (of the same dimensions as the classic film) treated in such a way as to wrap the products (with a total height of over 2 m) in the upper part and in the lower part and have the least number of turns in the central part. Or wrap only the complete sides of the boxes, leaving parts open for ventilation. All analyzed and processed step by step, communicated to the Customer’s data management system and connected for remote supervision and maintenance.
• An automatic line developed for the paper converting industry for the packaging of flat die-cut boxes, glued and simple cardboard. Each pallet loaded is accompanied by a series of data such as customer, weight, product specifications, location in the warehouse, recipe number, etc. Data that are then returned at the end of the automatic cycle, processed with the various transformation operations that took place within the line. All supervised by a remote assistance and remote diagnosis system connected directly to the Customer’s offices.

These are just two examples of automatic lines managed in compliance with Industry 4.0. We must not forget the certification linked to semi-automatic machines with integrated weighing systems, film consumption reading systems, equipped with technologies for the automatic definition of the type of product to be wrapped.