The giant Argentinian beverage producer, Refres Now, has invested in the biggest Sidel Combi ever built for filling carbonated soft drinks and in doing so has achieved a reduction in energy consumption of some 17%, as well as significantly improving bottle stability. Part of a complete line, the Sidel Combi was installed at the company’s bottling plant at La Matanza as a high-tech solution for bottling family pack sizes, which are in great demand in Argentina at the moment.
At La Matanza, in the Greater Buenos Aires province in Argentina, Refres Now has one of the largest soft drinks production facilities in the world. The plant produces more than ten different leading products each day, bottling a total of over 3.5 million litres. The company’s working relationship with Sidel, the leading global provider of PET solutions for liquid packaging, first began back in 2005 when Refres Now was originally founded. The recently installed complete line features a Sidel Combi Eurotronica FMc and a Sidel Starblend mixer. The line is presently achieving impressive production output rates of 30,000 bottles per hour for the larger two and a half litre bottles of carbonated soft drinks.
The Combi is equipped with 20 blow moulding stations, 162 electronic flowmeter filling valves and 18 capping heads. Brushless motors and an interface between blowing and filling functions contribute to energy savings and improved security. Through careful and precise control of the caps before the machine, the correct orientation and process quality are both assured to minimise problems and waste in the capper. Even for an organisation as big as Refres Now, the installation of the Sidel Combi Eurotronica line was a huge investment and it was one that is now seen to have paid off. As the company is also experiencing a comparative 17% saving in the use of electricity on the line, Refres Now is delighted with this performance and with the increased bottle base stability they have achieved, in addition to a better distribution of material. These higher quality bottles are therefore now better suited to withstanding the pressures of transportation and handling throughout the entire supply chain. This avoids any costly bottle deformities which may be generated by the increased internal pressure of the carbonated drinks’ bottles resulting from the ambient conditions experienced in Argentina: temperatures can reach up to 45°C with humidity levels climbing to 78%.
The success of the world’s largest Sidel Combi, has resulted in Refres Now viewing Sidel as a strategic partner in its bottling efforts. More than ever the Argentinian company is determined to take advantage of the very latest technology. So the company owners, Orlando and Walter Canido, recently visited several Sidel production sites in Europe to witness for themselves the Sidel Matrix™ system in operation. They visited sites in France and Italy to explore its potential and saw first-hand how the latest technology from Sidel can transform production. As a result, Refres Now is considering how best to employ this cutting-edge technology and is collaborating closely with Sidel in order to maintain its position at the forefront of the Argentinian domestic market.
