Modern folding-gluing machines churn through hundreds of feet of material each minute, producing boxes, cartons, and other cardboard products with breathtaking speed. Simply buying a folder gluer and setting it up, though, will never be enough to maximize its rate of output.
There are some simple, effective ways, however, to make sure a given folding-gluing machine will always be as productive as possible. Make use of the following three tips and your own folder gluer should hum along as quickly as its design allows.
- Standardize Setup Processes
Folder gluers like those detailed at sbl.tw/index_en.php are often rated to process hundreds of meters of material per minute. They are generally designed to do so in sustained fashion, too, once they are up and running.
Many folding-gluing production lines, however, are held back in practice by overly slow, meandering setup processes. Operators adjusting machines for new jobs too often do so without having much in the way of reliable, specific guidance.
That can mean making time-consuming tweaks and adjustments, instead of getting everything right from the start. The most efficient, productive folding-gluing shops develop reference books that do away with such problems.
It can take a while to put together an authoritative set of documents covering every conceivable setup. Over time, though, adding to the existing collection will become easier, since well-established reference points will already be available.
A setup logbook or other reference work can also be improved and refined as time goes on. That should ultimately make setup go as smoothly as the fast-paced work of folding and gluing itself.
- Add a Case Packer
Many folding-gluing machines are set up to feed directly into packing lines that can easily slow them down. Manual, labor-intensive packing work can easily become a bottleneck for a fast, reliable folder gluer.
Even simple, semi-automated case packers can speed things up considerably by keeping everything flowing. While some additional training will often be required, adding a well-designed packer to a production line normally proves fairly simple.
Of course, packers can benefit from the same procedural improvements that help folder gluers realize their potential. Put plenty of effort into standardizing setup processes for your new packer and it will repay the investment.
- Incorporate Automated Quality Control Features
Even the most reliably accurate folder gluers make mistakes from time to time. Quality control processes that rely too much on human attention and intervention tend to magnify the costs of such errors.
Automated systems that detect improper glue patterns, misaligned stock, and other problems can easily improve productivity. Many such systems can be fitted quite easily to folder gluers of various designs, as well.
Quality control equipment that replaces a certain amount of human labor with automation should normally be easy to justify on that basis alone. When the same system also elevates the productivity of an entire folding-gluing production line, the case should become even clearer.
A Bit of Effort Will Always Pay Off
Today’s top folder gluers are often so impressive out of the box that it can seem like they could hardly be improved upon. In many cases, putting a bit of effort into improving the productivity of a folding-gluing machine will make it an even more valuable asset.
This is particularly true given how easy and natural it often is to boost folder gluer output significantly. The three options detailed above have produced valuable results for many folder gluer owners.