There are steps every business needs to takes when considering the upgrade to their production facility.
A key step is identifying the right equipment for the immediate need as well as future growth.
I often receive calls from home-style business struggling on those ‘blue plastic manual’ trays and ready to take the next steps. In many of those cases the next step is quite a big step into the production version of a manual machine. The starting production version of a manual capsule filler makes 2000 capsules per hour (2000 x 7 hours per day x 22 working days = 300 000 capsules per month). A starting price for this kind of equipment is around R64 000 ex VAT. To consider if you are ready for this step first consider:
- How many capsules do you place in a bottle?
- How many bottles can you sell per month?
- How much profit will you make from those sales and how long will it take you to pay off this machine?
- TIP: These questions actually apply to any size capsule filler you plan to buy. To work out your return-on-investment you have to be able to forecast your sales and work backwards as to how long it will take you to pay back this machine. If you are in production in a larger business you know this is the question finance wants to be able to answer.
To specify a capsule filling machine you should be able to supply the following information:
- What size capsules are you working with (Sizes are #5,4,3,2,1,0,00,000)?
- How many capsules do you need to make per hour / per day or per month?
- Are you filling powders, pellets or liquids?
- Do you have 3 phase power, a factory air-line or compressor? This is a key factory requirement for all semi-auto and automatic capsule fillers.
What about polishing?
In many instances capsules require polishing. This provides your end user (your customer) with a nice looking, easy to digest capsule that has no presence of powders on the casing. There are two basic forms of capsule polishers;
- Polisher
- Polisher with sorter. This unit will use a pneumatic (air) system to blow under-filled capsules into a rejection box. It means by the time your capsule batch gets to the packing line you can be sure all the capsules are within the weight range.
I’m now polished, so what about counting and filling to bottles?
Its all based on the number of capsules you make per hour, the number of capsules you want to fill per bottle per hour and how long do you need to run for on a single batch/variant. So let us know these three points and we can easily direct you to the most suitable counting and bottle filling solution from manual counters to table top counters to fully auto counting lines for capsules (and tablets).
Cap me, Seal me and label me – I’m ready for sale!
Capping – so many options, from manual hand held pneumatic cap tighteners to semi- auto and fully auto options. Here is what we need to know to help you:
- Cap Dimensions
- How many bottles do you need to close per hour / per day?
- Are you able to work in a semi-auto format? Semi-auto capping usually involves two formats:
- Semi-auto working with two operators – one places the cap on the bottle, one uses the pneumatic cap tightener to secure the cap to the bottle
- Semi-auto working with one operator – one places the cap on the bottle, the machine tightens the cap.
- If you are into fully auto capping then there are options such as:
- Pick and Place
- Inline Feeding
- Rotary capping
Auto capping all comes down to speed. So let us know how many capsules and how many bottles per min and we will help you identify the correct machine.
In most pharmaceutical and neutroceutical applications an induction seal is needed. An induction seal is the paper seal you find between the cap/lid and the bottle opening which seals in the freshness of the capsules by reducing gaseous exchanges.
- TIP: When ordering your caps from your packaging supplier you must ask them to include the induction seal in your cap. An Induction seal machine only seals the paper to the bottle by a non-contact method. An induction sealing machine does not provide the seal itself.
Finally the labelling – its pretty simply. Tell us the label dimensions and how many bottles per min/per hour and will provide you the correct sized machine.