Case Studies

Future Nutrition 2022 DryGuide Installation

The Secomak DryGuide was the perfect choice for completely drying a full range of bottle sizes prior to the sleeve application.

The Customer – Future Nutrition

Future Nutrition was established in 2010 and located on the same original site as their sister company Donohoe Drinks, who have developed, manufactured, and bottled spirits, beers, and soft drinks since 1876.

They are a family-owned business based in Ireland, spanning four generations, a private label formulation, development and manufacturing partner that is fully focused on helping to develop the best tasting functional beverages and ready to mix powders. From functional shots to beauty waters to energy drinks. From protein powders, to pre-workout to superfoods.

The Challenge

Future Nutrition are dedicated and passionate about creating the highest quality products and have made several upgrades to their state-of-the-art production facility. One of these upgrades includes a new shrink sleeve applicator and steam tunnel catering for a lager range of bottles, high speed shrink sleeve labelling providing a high shrink quality.

One of the issues they faced was sleeving larger PET bottles. When cold filled, condensation would form on the exterior surfaces of the bottle, significantly affecting the ability to apply sleeve correctly & efficiently. The moisture would cause the sleeve to stick in the incorrect position resulting in poor quality, a high number of rejections, reducing the lines output. This was not acceptable, one of Future Nutrition’s strength is their agility to adapt to customer requirements and ability to produce large variety of products with little notice.

They needed to find a solution, one that met their demanding specifications as well as being available on short notice. As a Contract Manufacturer they are often working with short production runs and multiple format sizes, (as many as 21 SKUs). Therefore, whatever solution they opted for needed to not only be capable of drying all the different sizes but be able to change over quickly whilst guaranteeing the performance.

The Solution

The Secomak DryGuide was the perfect choice for completely drying a full range of bottle sizes prior to the sleeve application. With capacity of up to 40,000 bottler per hour, it not only met immediate the demands but provides plenty of capacity as this company continues to grow.

The machine has been developed with the end user in mind and the demands on current production lines, with fewer operators and more production lines running multi formats. Whilst the angle of the air has been fixed there are still adjustments required when changing between formats. Adjustments are achieved without the use of tools, there are markings and product stops to ensure repeatable settings. Changes can be made in seconds with the confidence knowing that when that first new container is run it will be dry.

On a recent visit some 20 months since the installation Damien Davitt, the Production Manager of Future Nutrition said.

“The DryGuide machine has been brilliant and hasn’t given us one issue in the 18 months it has been in production. It was installed by us, and we loved how easy it was to setup, as soon as it was powered, we were drying bottles. It is so easy to adjust been bottles, being a Contract Manufacturer, we have can run as many as 20 different SKUs in small batches, so it is important than changes are quick and easy without impacting results. The DryGuide really achieves this! Prior to installation, condensation was playing havoc to our productivity. Since installed, we have not had a single stoppage in production, increasing the efficiency tenfold. I can’t speak highly enough on the impact the machine has had to the business and our production capabilities.”

The Benefits

Utilising computational fluid dynamic simulation, high speed photography, wind tunnels & energy monitoring equipment we really have put science in drying. We have studied the impact of airflow with surfaces of containers and identified how best to dry containers. The DryGuide technology development utilises all that data and we have produced a product that not only achieves the optimum position for drying but is fixed. Ensuring that the airflow is in the correct position not only guarantees the product will be dry but is done so with as little energy consumption as possible.

With our “DryGuide” technology we have integrated the air blade into the guidance system fixing the angle the air exists and is delivered to containers. This has two main advantages.

  1. The operator has very few adjustments meaning ease of setting machine in relation to the container. By fixing the drying fixtures into the optimum position we remove all the guess work and guarantee that the container will be dried.
  2. Ensures the airflow is closer to the bottle. In a typical drying machine, there is a need for conveyor guides to ensure the container is guided around the production line. Guides inside a drying machine impact the performance, not only do they interfere with the airflow, but they reduce the impacted pressure of the air by being further away from the surface you are trying to dry.

This development allows the airflow to be closer to area of the container we are drying resulting in a far more energy efficient result.


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