Case Studies QVCS01
Quadro Vac
 

OPTIMIZING PNEUMATIC CONVEYOR FOR MULTIPLE PRODUCTS
 

Problem

A major pharmaceutical company needed to move more than 200 products from a dryer, through their mill and into Intermediate Bulk Containers (IBC). The properties of the products varied significantly, therefore the conveyor needed to have the versatility to handle all the products. The rigorous cleaning schedule of the conveyor demands that the conveyor, not only meet pharmaceutical sanitary standards but also have a quick disassembly/reassembly design.

Quadro Vac Solution

The Quadro Vac was originally designed to meet the cGMP guidelines set by the FDA for the pharmaceutical industry. Quadro Vac has been used in the pharmaceutical industry for the last 15 years. The modular design inherently allowed for quick assembly and disassembly of the main parts. The standard unit comes apart into 4 main pieces easily, the cap, the hopper, the dump-gate and the discharge shroud.

For this customer, Quadro engineered every part for easy disassembly and reassembly WITHOUT any tools. Unlike other modular designs, Quadro has machined critical surfaces to ensure the unit is leak-proof, even after all the extra handling required for cleaning of the units.

The Quadro Vac was supplied with a variable speed pump and computerized User Interface controls. The speed of the pump, the cycle times and filter cleaning times are all easily set on a touchscreen control pad. For this customer, the run parameters for all 250 products were entered by the Process Engineer on a laptop and downloaded onto the Quadro Vac's control panel with ease. The User Interface is equipped with multi security levels to ensure full flexibility by all users without risk of unauthorized process changes.

  

Summary

The product changeover time was significantly reduced. The units were disassembled for cleaning and reassembled for processing quickly. The operator simply had to enter the product code on the drum label into the User Interface touchscreen pad to convey the product at maximum capacity. They no longer need to change the various times and speeds to optimize the process.