Containers: form-fill-seal

Where folding cartons are to contain a product which is sensitive to moisture pickup, barriers are available which can be incorporated into the carton construction. An example of this is polyethylene laminated to paperboard. In some cases an insert bag is used instead, but this requires an additional operation and is usually accomplished by a form-fill-seal machine that makes a bag which is then inserted by another machine into the folding carton. 

An alternative form of non-carbonated beverage comes in form-fill-seal plastic containers, which are typically square or round section cups with foil or plastic laminate lidding. Such products are difficult to produce to a quality that will satisfactorily compete with the shelf fife of aseptic foil/laminate packs. Fonn-fill-seal containers leave their contents vulnerable to oxidative degradation and are especially at risk of mould spoilage. The packs can be produced in aseptic conditions but the products are typically chemically preserved. 

There are some more specialised systems for PET bottles, cans, other plastic bottles, form-fill-seal packs and returnable PET or glass bottles for still and carbonated drinks (generally high acid). These are material-dependent solutions and each arises from the limitations and properties of the materials and the way they are formed into containers. 

Unit-dose systems offer the easiest technical solution to this problem, but have the disadvantages of higher cost of manufacture and of not being as compact as a multidose product containing equivalent doses. Unit-dose products are usually made of low-density polyethylene (LDPE), with the formulated sterile solution being without a preservative, and sealed using the form-fill-seal process. 

All the above processes can also be used in a form fill seal process with, for example, thermoforming and cold forming blister packs. Rommelag type bottle pack systems use an extrusion process where the container is formed by either blowing or vacuum (smaller sizes). Immediately after this, containers are filled, and the pack is sealed (welded) by using the residual heat in an extension to the main body of the container. 

However, since most are reel-fed materials involving form fill seal activities, the space required for the storage of incoming materials is significantly less than for preformed containers which store air. There is also a significant saving in weight and space in many circumstances. 

The whole operation of forming a sterile container, filling it, and sealing it, is conducted within one machine. The filling zone for aseptic filling is afforded localized filtered air protection. There is no intervention from personnel until after the filled presentation is sealed and automatically moved away from the point of fill. What need therefore for location within a Class 100 clean room, or for protection by the double barrier principle Support for this argument has come mainly from media fill studies conducted with machines located in Class 10,000 areas [10]. Accumulation of uncontaminated individual trials, each of several units of thousands of items to total numbers of several tens and even hundreds of thousands of items has been used to claim equivalence between form-fill-seal in Class 10,000 clean rooms with conventional double-barrier aseptic fill in Class 100 clean rooms. 

The edges of the heat-seal bars are often rounded so that they do not puncture the packaging material. Often the contact surface of one of the bars contains a resilient material to aid in achieving uniform pressure in the seal area. Bar sealing is the most commonly used method of heat-sealing packaging materials, and Is often used in form-fill-seal operations. 

The speciality polyolefin alloys are soft and flexible, halogen-free and plasticizer-free, good contact clarity, sterilizable, heat or radiofrequency sealable, good barrier properties, excellent chemical or solvent resistance, comply wit USP class VI, environmentally safe for disposition, ease of fabrication, and cost effective. Rxloy products, developed by Ferro Corporation, find medical applications in fluid administration, prefilled containers, blood bags, flexible containers, urine collection bags, and dry bags. These applications are from Rxloy FFS (form/fill/seal) and RF (radio fre-... 

The filling mandrels are comprised of a set of filling tips which are held within a protective air shower this is a small area within the filling machine which is typically fed with sterile filtered air. When the molds are beneath the air shower, the filling tips are lowered into the neck of the partially formed container and the containers are filled. The mandrels return to the protective air shower, and the containers are sealed... 

There are several machine systems available for aseptically filling glass and plastic bottles for still juices. (Aseptic filling of drink cartons is covered in Section 9.7.) Carbonated drinks are not aseptically filled. There are two main aseptic filling workflows, with a third workflow used less frequently. The first system sterilises the container, fills and seals it the second takes a sealed, precleaned bottle, removes the seal in a sterile environment, fills and re-seals the container. The third system blows a bottle and while it is still sterile fills it and then seals it, all within the same machine, this is known as a form-fill-seaF (FFS) system. 

Reduce the flow rate to lOOml/min and start sampling from the discharge end of the pump. To minimize turbulence and exposure to air, let the water flow down the side of the sampling container. First, fill the vials for VOC analysis until a meniscus forms above the neck of a VO A vial. Seal each vial with a PTFE-lined septum cap, invert the vial, and gently tap it. If an air bubble forms in the vial, discard the sample, and fill another container. 

The blow/fill/seal process is a complete packaging technique that integrates the extrusion or IBM and container filling steps. This can provide for aseptic filling of the hot as-blown container and is used for pharmaceutical, food, and cosmetic products. The process employs a two-part mold in which the container body mold cavity blocks are separate from the neck-forming members. 

The body mold closes on the parison that is blown normally by a neck calibrating blow pin. Immediately, with the mold still closed, the liquid contents are injected through the pin. The pin is then withdrawn and the neck is formed and sealed under vacuum by the neck-forming members. Both mold parts then open to eject a filled and sealed container. Small containers may be formed entirely by vacuum rather than blowing. 

The filling of plastic containers is accomplished using two very different approaches. Pre-formed containers can be sterilized in bulk, introduced into the aseptic suite via air locks, oriented (unscrambled), and filled. Blow-fill-seal prepares sterile bottles (most often LDPE) on line just prior to filling and sealing. 

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