Coca Cola India – standards for empty bottle inspection

Coca-Cola is getting ready for the Indian market. Besides opening new plants, the company invests in the quality of the extisting plant, for example by installing eight new Linatronic 735 empty bottle inspectors. A trial machine was tested beforehand in actual operation at the plant in Hyderabad.
One major advantage of the Linatronic 735 is its modularised construction, which enables the inspection modules required to be chosen to suit the job profile involved, or retrofitted at need. The camera technology and all the significant parameters can be set from a single central point. The IRIS inspection technology has been fitted with a software package for object detection.

For the eight Linatronic 735s it’s ordered Coca-Cola India initially opted for three modules:

• base inspection 
• inner sidewall inspection 
• and residual-liquid monitoring.

For base inspection, the camera takes a picture of the container’s base, which is evenly illuminated by a flash lamp. Another camera, with the aid of this lighting unit, inspects the inner wall through the container’s opening. This is particularly important for the large-area ACL permanent labels of the kind used on the returnable glass bottles. Residual liquid in the container is detected by two systems operating independently of each other: a broad-band infra-red system detects all liquids, while a high-frequency system is ideally suited for discovering even the tiniest traces of residual caustic. This parallel use of both technologies ensures maximised dependability for the bottler concerned.
In addition, the pilot machine in Hyderabad will be fitted with inspection modules for outer sidewall and sealing surface, once again for test purposes. The sealing surface inspection system detects even the tiniest of chips in the vicinity of the sealing surface and cracks in the glass. The sidewall inspection system detects large-area chipping in the sidewalls and scuff marks. With these two additional modules, the test machine has now been equipped to handle all-surface empty-bottle inspection.