Bottle containment filler plays it safe

"The machine features a product containment compartment that completely seals the product from the outside environment using slight negative pressure inside the product containment area," explains Matt Neumann, Aylward's VP sales and marketing. Aylward also supplied a containment system for delivery of bulk product into the hopper. The system allows operators to attach drums and plastic bags containing bulk product to a funnel system, which then transfers the tablets directly to the filler's containment area. At no time do the operators come into contact with the product.

"We designed this system to eliminate the use of protective suits," says Neumann. "It's inconvenient and costly to suit up every time you get close to the equipment. And the respirators are also cumbersome."

Once the product enters the filler, a vacuum system draws 1,100 cfm (cubic feet per minute) of air from the fill room into the filler, drawing tablets into the wheels and dedusting them, explains Ken Lang, engineering product manager, Bristol-Myers Squibb.

Tablets are inspected and counted as they pass by an electronic eye before falling into bottles. Dust is pulled away from the operators at all times, says Lang. The machine fills 100- to 1,000-count bottles supplied by Rexam in the following sizes: 95-cc square, 60-cc round, 100-cc oblong, 200-cc round, and 325-cc oblong. Machine speeds range from 130 to 160 bottles a minute for a 100-count bottle. If a tablet is damaged or a miscount occurs, the bottle enters a reject area.

Canister desiccants from Sud-Chemie are inserted into the bottles prior to entering the filler via conveyor. Once the bottles exit the filler, a Lakso cottoner from IMA Nova inserts cotton into the bottles, at which point they pass through a metal detector from Lock Inspection Systems .

Bottles are then capped with a capper from Fowler Products Co.. Rexam supplies the 33-mm, 38-mm, and 45-mm child-resistant caps. The caps are induction-sealed with a Kaps-All Automate induction sealer and retorqued with a Kaps-All retorquer. A labeler from Weiler Labeling Systems applies a single-ply, pressure-sensitive label and a patient outsert from CCL Label to each bottle. Finally, bottles are hand-packed into shipping cases from Smurfit-Stone Container Corp. and placed on a checkweigher from Mettler Toledo.

A breath of fresh air

Before the operator enters the fill room, pressurized anterooms extract dust particles and dirt from the fill room via an exhaust system. As the photo shows, the Model 815 filler's vacuum system pulls air and dust upward through an exhaust duct (right).

"The pressurized anterooms serve as bubble airlocks," explains Lang, "so there's a 0.03- to 0.06-inch water column minimum differential across the door between the filling room and the anteroom." An HVAC system provides 12 air changes per hour in the fill room through HEPA filters, and a dedicated dust collector collects dust from the bulk tablet loading system, filling machine, capper, and conveyor covers.

Bristol-Myers Squibb has been using the new filler for approximately six months, and during that time there have been no miscounts. "Accuracy has improved 100-percent," says Lang. Changeovers have been reduced from 4 hours to 3.5 hours and productivity has increased. But most importantly, operators no longer need to wear personal protection. [HCP]

--By Kassandra Kania, Contributing Editor