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To present, it was not possible to bag dusty and heavy-flowing as well as fluidized products using FFS packaging systems. The OPAL, presented by German based Windmöller & Hölscher (W&H) at interpack for the first time, does away with this drawback. It incorporates a closed system (patent pending) that ensures controlled bagging of the difficult to handle products, with minimum entrapped air.
The key to the trouble-free handling of such products is the auger feed system, which allows the product to be delivered into the bag with no air entrapped. To ensure that even after leaving the drop chute, no air will be allowed to get into the product, the chute outlet is always kept below the product level. In this way, no dust can escape and the sack mouth is kept clean, a requirement for high strength top seals.
Throughout the filling process, the chute outlet and the product level are maintained constant. This is enabled by a system that lowers the sack at the same rate as the product in it is getting higher. Once the desired filling weight is reached – it is determined by a special weight measurement process – the drop chute automatically seals up so that subsequent trickling of product is reliably avoided and the set filling weight exactly maintained at all times. Evacuation elements take care that fluidized products are perfectly compacted in the sack.
Alternatively, the OPAL can be delivered in ex-proof design (ATEX) or laid out for food packaging applications.
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