Tinplate can defects wiped out using industrial grade vision from Cognex

Citation

(2005), "Tinplate can defects wiped out using industrial grade vision from Cognex", Sensor Review, Vol. 25 No. 3. https://doi.org/10.1108/sr.2005.08725caf.001

Tinplate can defects wiped out using industrial grade vision from Cognex

Tinplate can defects wiped out using industrial grade vision from Cognex

Keywords: Image sensors, Inspection

MIVISA's mission is to serve its customers, providing the widest product range on the market to cover the full spectrum of tinplate canning needs and focusing on excellence in customer service, quality, production capacity and innovation. The strategy of the company consists of continuously developing and improving the industrial, logistics and sales processes, and building customer services in order to fully meet the needs of producers in the food industry.

The Las Torres de Cotillas plant which is located just outside Murcia, Spain, is dedicated to coil cutting, coating and printing. Mivisa's specialities are standard end cans, easy-open ends, twist off caps, two- piece cans and three-piece cans. This integrated production means that clients receive cans that are foolproof and ready to be filled; they are later packed with items such as sardines, asparagus, pre-cooked dishes and many other comestible goods.

The selection process for choosing the right vision supplier was long and methodical for this reputed manufacturer; the strategic choice for widely implementing vision was made internally with the counsel of Mr Pedro Ruiz Carrasco an engineer specializing in automation and vision. Mr Ruiz attributes the decision to integrate vision into the production lines to the desire to respond to the client's needs. He admits that there were already existing vision systems on some production lines, and he saw clearly the advantage of using them. However, he knew that there were major improvements that needed to be made in order to maximize the potential; it was at this time that he decided to call upon Cognex and three other major competitors to see which provider best met the need. After 4 months of tests on similar production lines, Mivisa decided on the Cognex In- Sight^© products, which provided the best results across the board based on the initially set criteria.

On one particular production line that produces tin caps for cans at the rate of 20,000 per hour, there are vision systems working at a speed of 300 ppm to allow three primary inspection applications to take place: the inspection of the paneling, the inspection of the curling (deformations of the surface) and the verification of the sealing. Each step of this process is key in guaranteeing that Mivisa will deliver products that are free of stray glue and defects that may inhibit the proper closing of a lid on a container. The reliability of the expulsion of defective products has been a valuable tool for the quality control department. With the actual system in place the production lines have become much more efficient and the number of false rejects has significantly been reduced. Every 8h when there is a maintenance check, the transparency of the system allows for verification that all systems are functioning correctly and if there is a problem, it can be identified with relative ease. The network is Ethernet based and links In-Sight vision sensors from both the 1000 and 3000 series (Plate 1). The simplicity of the interface of the vision systems at Mivisa allows the maintenance crew to adapt the settings easily so that the items being manufactured on a production line can be controlled relative to different needs.

Plate 1 In-Sight 3000 (left) and In-Sight 1000 (right) acquiring images of lids in a dome light

The primary benefits that Mivisa has in using vision systems today are that the quality of the products received by the clients is unsurpassed, and there is no longer an accumulation of non- conform products that give way to financial losses.

According to Mr Ruiz, the Las Torres de Cotillas mill will be benefiting from more vision systems in the next 2 years due to the fact that vision has become an integral part of their productivity and growth: “The complete integration of vision is done internally in partnership with Cognex. This allows for great versatility in the development of the inspections, which is strategic for the growth of Mivisa”.

For further information visit Cognex web site: www.cognex.co.uk