PLC-based system checks bottle tops: Compact three-camera, system with off-the-shelf components provides 360° inspection and defective-part rejection

摘要

With millions of beverage bottles produced in a year, ensuring the integrity of each one is a significant production challenge. To help solve this problem, Silgan Equipment Company (formerly White Cap), maker and supplier of metal, plastic, and composite closures in lug, press-on/twist-off, and aluminum roll-on styles, asked Manufacturing Control Solutions (MCS) for an automated, 360° inspection system that could identify defects in the capping process and fill levels in real time and send that information to an Allen-Bradley MicroLogix PLC that controls an eject unit to track the bad bottles. Silgan also needed a system compact enough to be placed on existing production lines and to tie into its current bottling systems (see Fig. 1).