Formers - Vertical Baggers Archives - Greener Corporation

QUICK TIPS: Troubleshooting Forming Problems on Vertical FFS Baggers

Michael Wojtech — Tue, 07 Oct 2025 16:13:42 +0000

A Tech Bite from Greener Vice-President & co-owner Matt Wojtech

This Greener Tech Bite, in partnership with Kenray Forming, provides QUICK TIPS for troubleshooting three common forming problems on vertical baggers: torn or broken packaging material, wrinkled and scored packages, and open back seals.

Former Design and Precision

Both proper design and consistently precise fabrication of formers are critical to their proper function.

Shoulder Geometry

Incorrect shoulder geometry can tear or break the packaging material, create wrinkles, and cause open back seals.

Crossover Point

Tearing and breakage are also caused by sharp edges or by inadequate clearance at the crossover point on the former.

If the crossover point is mispositioned, open back seals can result.

Clearance Between the Tube and Shoulder

The clearance between the forming tube and forming shoulder must be the proper dimension and must remain consistent around this intersection.

Improper clearance, often created by imprecise former geometry and misalignment between the tube and shoulder, is a common cause of chronic forming issues.

Pinch points where this clearance is too narrow create excess tension that can tear or break the packaging material.

These pinch points also create score marks that degrade package appearance and can reduce the material’s barrier capacity.

Kenray’s unique manufacturing process allows them to fabricate formers with precise, constant clearance between the shoulder and the tube, so they can provide narrower clearance widths, without pinch points, that produce more accurate, consistent bag sizes.

Formers without Kenray’s unique level of precision must have wider clearance between the tube and shoulder to avoid pinch points, which can result in more variable bag sizes, wrinkles, and other issues.

Former Condition

Former condition is also important. Over time, the packaging material wears the lip of the forming shoulder as it moves across it and can eventually create an uneven edge, often referred to as shark’s teeth.

This rough edge creases the material and creates jagged score marks down the outside surface of the package.

Formers should be regularly inspected and replaced or refurbished when the shoulder begins to wear.

Former Adjustment

Former misadjustments are another cause of forming problems.

Rollers that are adjusted too far back can cause score marks on the inside and outside of the bag.

Formers that are not correctly positioned can cause open back seals.

Troubleshooting Forming Problems on Vertical FFS Baggers

The design, precision, condition, and adjustment of the formers on your vertical baggers—even the seemingly smallest details—can have a big impact on package quality and productivity.

Do you need to troubleshoot forming problems on your vertical baggers? Contact Greener Corporation and Kenray Forming. We provide integrated parts and technical service solutions worldwide.

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Preventative Maintenance Quick Tips for Flow Wrappers and Vertical FFS Baggers

Michael Wojtech — Sun, 27 Oct 2024 12:20:59 +0000

Many simple, easily implemented setup and preventative maintenance steps on flow wrappers and vertical baggers can have an outsized effect on package quality and productivity.

This Greener Tech Bite presents a series of Quick Tips that prevent cutting, sealing, and forming problems and help you troubleshoot issues when they do occur.

Cutting

Clean Knife and Anvil Slots

The value of cleaning on a regular schedule, instead of waiting until product contamination causes problems, can’t be overstated.

To clean knife and anvil slots on rotary sealing jaws, cut a piece of scouring pad and push it down into the slot with a hex wrench. And don’t neglect to clean the anvil slot, even though it can be more challenging to access.

Product buildup in the slot creates an unstable base that can cause intermittent cutting problems and knife failure.

Sealing

Clean Sealing Jaws Regularly

Clean sealing jaws regularly, but don’t use stiff, coarse bristled brushes—they damage the serrations and cause sealing problems.

Brushes with finer, softer bristles are more forgiving. They can be trimmed in length to clean more effectively and to keep them from splaying out.

After cleaning the jaws, run a carbon impression to check the current set up so that you can make any necessary corrective adjustments before resuming production.

Install Sealing Jaws with New Bolts and Washers

Install sealing jaws with new mounting bolts and washers. Worn, damaged bolts and washers, which can easily go unnoticed, cause inaccurate mounting and make jaws difficult to remove in the future.

To ensure accurate setup and to prevent the jaws from shifting out of alignment, use hardened, flat washers to mount jaws on flat surfaces.

Spherical washers or, if they are not available, split washers are best for mounting jaws on round shafts.

Replace All Rotary Sealing Jaws at the Same Time

Replace all rotary sealing jaws on a machine at the same time, and make sure all the jaws come from the same supplier.

You may be tempted to replace only one jaw, or just one of multiple pairs, to save time or reduce costs. But inaccurate setup caused by sealing jaws with different wear levels and designs creates sealing problems.

Check Sealing Jaw Temperatures with a Pyrometer

Sealing jaws are often hotter in the middle than at the ends, where heat dissipates more quickly. The controller, however, does not reveal this variability, since it usually only indicates the temperature at one point within the jaw.

Use a pyrometer to regularly check multiple points across the functional length of the sealing face, to make sure temperatures remain within the seal range for your flexible packaging material and conditions.

Ongoing issues with inconsistent sealing temperatures can be solved with updated heater and sealing jaw designs.

Forming

Vertical Baggers: Maintain Proper Roller Adjustment

On vertical baggers, adjust the rollers to create even, consistent contact between the material and the forming collar wing—between positions 1 and 2 in the diagram.

Too much, too little, or uneven tension, demonstrated by positions 3 and 4, can cause wrinkles and creases that degrade package appearance and cause sealing problems.

Flow Wrappers: Adjust & Tighten Guide Rails & Deck Plates

On flow wrappers, make sure the product guide rails and deck plates are adjusted and tightened properly, and exercise care when removing and reinstalling deck plates—they can be easily bent or otherwise damaged.

Misadjusted rails or deck plates that are not level and smooth can inhibit the movement of the product and packaging material and cause malformed packages that delay production.

Also make sure the forming box is square and level.

Preventative Maintenance Quick Tips

By investing a relatively small amount of consistent time and effort, preventative maintenance can help you decrease problems that delay production and reduce package quality.

To learn more about solutions for improving package quality and productivity on flow wrappers and vertical baggers, visit our Technical Resource Blog and contact Greener Corporation.

We provide integrated parts and technical services worldwide.

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Flexible Packaging Materials Consulting

Michael Wojtech — Mon, 23 Sep 2024 17:10:52 +0000

Greener Corporation provides a broad range of Flexible Packaging Materials Consulting resources for flow wrappers and vertical baggers.

Whether you need to assess your current material or evaluate new structures, our materials and machinery experts can help you Establish Objectives, Identify Options, Run Trials, and to Select and Implement the material that best meets your objectives.

Integrated Solutions

Greener’s integrated approach considers how the design and condition of your flow wrappers or vertical baggers will affect results and determines what machine adjustments or component updates may be needed.

Early Involvement & Collaboration

The earlier in your selection project that we work with you, and the more we collaborate with packagers, machinery OEMs, and materials suppliers, the more effectively we can integrate four essential elements of your process to produce optimal, timely results.

1. Establish Packaging Objectives

Greener can help you establish clear packaging objectives, based on the requirements of your product, distribution channel, and other criteria, that provide important standards for evaluating a material’s performance.

Barrier Properties

Barrier Properties protect against the transfer of odors, gases, or moisture.

Seal Integrity

Seal Integrity should correlate with your barrier requirements.

Sustainability

Sustainable recyclable and compostable materials must meet specific compositional and structural guidelines.

Machinability

Machinability testing indicates how a material’s thickness, stiffness, coefficient of friction, thermal conductivity, and other properties affect the packaging process.

Cost

Per-package material cost and the anticipated costs of machine downtime and scrap rates must also be considered.

2. Identify New Material Options

If you are unable to meet your objectives with your current material, we can help determine a list of new material options—perhaps even suggesting materials you may not have considered.

3. Trials and Evaluations

To help narrow your initial list down to the most promising options, Greener can assist with preliminary machine trials at your facility or run these trials in our Packaging Lab.

We can then help you run more extensive trials with this refined list of materials.

Adjustments and Part Designs

Before you run trials, Greener can assess the characteristics of these materials and recommend machine adjustments or updates to former, sealing jaw, and other part designs that are needed to optimize results and get a truer picture of each material’s potential.

A new material that meets your objectives for sustainability, for instance, might require higher seal initiation temperatures and be more easily damaged by excess pressure.

Package Testing

To evaluate machine trial results, we’ll help you establish criteria and determine the best package testing methods. For example, if your product does not require a material with a strong oxygen barrier, then seal integrity does not need to be hermetic.

Packages can be tested at your facility or in our Packaging Lab.

4. Select and Implement New Material

Well executed machine trials and testing can be used to determine which flexible packaging material best meets your objectives in a production setting.

We will help you implement changes to adjustment procedures and component designs, along with any necessary training, on the wrappers or baggers that will run the new material and ensure consistent results across different makes or models of machinery and at multiple facilities.

Greener’s Flexible Packaging Materials Consulting provides an additional resource to help you integrate and improve all aspects of your packaging process.

To learn more about solutions for improving package quality and productivity on flow wrappers and vertical baggers, contact Greener Corporation. We provide integrated parts and technical services worldwide.

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Sustainable Packaging 3: Running Paper-Based Materials on Flow Wrappers and Vertical FFS Baggers

Michael Wojtech — Mon, 26 Aug 2024 11:28:21 +0000

Paper-based flexible packaging is increasingly considered as a sustainable alternative to polymer-based flexible packaging solutions.

Segment 3 in Greener’s Sustainability Series explores potential obstacles to forming and sealing paper-based materials on flow wrappers and vertical baggers and presents solutions for maintaining package quality and productivity with these new structures.

Paper-Based Flexible Packaging Materials

Characteristics

Four characteristics of paper affect its performance.

1. Sealability

First, paper is not sealable by itself. To be utilized in flexible packaging, paper must also include a cold seal adhesive or heat activated sealant layer.

Paper is also less thermally conductive than most polymer-based materials which may led to sealing problems.

2. Barrier

Paper alone does not provide adequate barrier protection and requires additional treatments to contain the product’s aroma and flavor and protect against outside contaminates.

3. Recyclability

To be considered recyclable, paper-based flexible packaging must contain at least 70-90% paper, depending on regional or national requirements.

This criterion limits the thickness of additional sealant and barrier layers and can affect their functionality.

4. Thickness and Stiffness

Paper-based materials also tend to be thicker and stiffer than traditional materials, with significantly less capacity for elongation.

Forming Issues

The characteristics of paper-based flexible packaging materials can make forming more difficult.

These thicker, stiffer materials require extra tension to draw them through the wrapper or bagger and can be easily buckled, wrinkled, and damaged by standard forming components, causing sealing problems and fractures to sealant and barrier coatings that leave them less effective.

These forming issues may not be readily apparent, so packages should be regularly tested.

Forming Solutions

Specialized Formers

Specialized formers designed for paper-based flexible packaging are often required to maintain even, consistent tracking that alleviates excess stress and damage.

Greener Corporation partners with Kenray Forming to provide these specialized forming solutions.

Power Film Drive

Wrappers and baggers without a power film drive may need this feature added, since relying exclusively on fin wheels or belts can magnify forming problems with paper-based materials.

Fin Wheels

On flow wrappers, customized fin wheel designs such as gripper grooves and Dura-Therm material may be needed to draw the thicker and stiffer material and prevent slippage.

Sealing Issues

Heat Sealing Problem

As explained in our previous Tech Bite, the effective seal range of a packaging material is defined as the difference between the seal initiation temperature and the distortion temperature.

With all materials, machine speeds are limited by the need to fit normal sealing jaw temperature cycles within the seal range.

Paper-based structures, with greater thickness, stiffness, lower thermal conductivity, and potentially thinner sealant layers, can require longer dwell times for heat from the sealing jaws to reach and activate the sealant. This reduces their seal range and may lead to sealing problems.

Reductions to machine speed may be necessary to seal the package and caulk off leaks.

Pressure

The heat transfer limitations of paper-based materials, along with their extra thickness and stiffness, can make it difficult to apply the sealing pressure required to produce quality seals—especially across gaps at the corners and at the fin or lap seal.

Sealing jaw setup and design become especially critical. The serrations must apply enough pressure to activate and help move the limited amounts of sealant into gaps to caulk off leaks, yet not exert excess pressure that crushes or splits these more easily damaged structures.

Sealing Solutions

Setup and Adjustments

Adjustments that work with traditional materials may need to be checked with carbon impressions and refined for greater accuracy.

Dura-Therm Sealing Jaws

Sealing Jaws made from Greener’s proprietary Dura-Therm alloy provide more responsive and consistent thermal conductivity to reduce temperature cycle fluctuations, helping to keep them within the paper-based material’s seal range and to maintain production speeds.

Sealing Jaw Serration Pattern

To provide the even, consistent heat transfer and sealing pressure that paper-based structures require, your sealing jaw serration pattern should be custom designed for your specific material, machinery, and conditions.

Easy Seal™️ FLEX Jaws

And Greener’s Easy Seal™️ FLEX Jaws further optimize sealing pressure by compensating for the extra layers of material at the fin seal.

Collaboration

Collaboration is a key component for successfully running paper-based flexible packaging materials.

Greener Corporation works with packagers, machine manufacturers, and material suppliers to provide material evaluations, setup and procedural changes, customized components, and technical service solutions.

Paper-based flexible packaging materials have been most widely implemented on cold seal applications for products with less stringent barrier requirements, such as some candy, and on secondary packaging for multi-packs of previously packaged items.

The ultimate goal is to enable the use of these and other sustainable materials for a wider variety of applications without sacrificing seal quality or productivity.

To learn more about running sustainable materials on flow wrappers and vertical baggers, contact Greener Corporation. We provide integrated parts and technical services worldwide.

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Sustainable Packaging Materials 2: Running Mono Polyethylene & Mono Polypropylene on Flow Wrappers & Vertical FFS Baggers

Michael Wojtech — Thu, 08 Feb 2024 14:51:49 +0000

Most traditional flexible packaging is made from multiple layers of different materials that can’t be easily separated. Mono polyethylene (PE) and mono polypropylene (PP) are produced from the same or similar materials, and are the most common polymer-based sustainable packaging materials we’ve encountered so far.

Segment 2 in our Sustainability Series explores the properties that can make mono PE and mono PP more challenging to form, cut, and seal, and presents solutions for maintaining package quality and machine speeds when running these materials on flow wrappers and vertical FFS baggers.

FORMING Mono PE & Mono PP Packaging Materials

During the forming process, the thicker, stiffer nature of mono PE and mono PP structures creates greater tension in the web. On both flow wrappers and vertical baggers, a power film drive will help keep these structures tracking properly.

Specially designed formers are often required to maintain consistently sized packages that are free from creasing and scoring.

CUTTING Mono PE & Mono PP Packaging Materials

The mechanical properties of these thicker and stiffer structures can also make cutting more challenging.

Knives designed for your specific packaging material will improve cutting performance.

Special features such as an extreme angle zig zag knife can improve openability for the consumer.

SEALING Mono PE & Mono PP Packaging Materials

As explained in our previous Tech Bite, the effective seal range of a packaging material is defined as the difference between the seal initiation temperature and the distortion temperature.

With all flexible packaging materials, machine speeds are limited by the need to fit normal sealing jaw temperature cycles within the seal range.

Many current mono PE and mono PP structures have a lower distortion temperature, which decreases their seal range.

And since these mono structures tend to be thicker and stiffer, higher sealing jaw temperatures are needed for heat to reach and activate the sealant layer. This further reduces the seal range.

With sealing jaw temperature increases limited by the lower distortion point, reductions to machine speed may be necessary to provide adequate dwell time for seal initiation.

Sealing Solutions

Advanced sealing jaw designs can help mitigate sealing issues encountered with mono PE and mono PP materials. Sealing jaws made from Greener Corp’s proprietary Dura-Therm alloy provide more responsive and consistent thermal conductivity across the sealing face to reduce temperature cycle fluctuations and help maintain seal quality and machine speeds.

Temperatures don’t spike as high when the machine idles, or drop as far when the line restarts.

Customized sealing jaw serration patterns and options such as Easy Seal™ FLEX jaws can also reduce temperature cycles by optimizing thermal transfer and sealing pressure.

In addition to sealing jaw design, optimized adjustment procedures and training are critically important for maintaining seal quality and machine speeds on flow wrappers and vertical baggers.

To learn more about sustainable flexible packaging materials, advanced part designs, machine adjustments, and training, contact Greener Corporation.

We provide integrated parts, industrial packaging solutions and technical services worldwide.

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Sustainable Packaging Materials: 1. Types and Considerations for Flow Wrappers & Vertical FFS Baggers

Michael Wojtech — Sun, 12 Nov 2023 19:34:46 +0000

Introducing Greener Corporation’s NEW Tech Bites series about running sustainable packaging materials on flow wrappers and vertical FFS baggers. In this first segment we introduce the basic types of sustainable packaging materials and some fundamental considerations for selecting, testing, and running these structures.

Traditional Flexible Packaging Materials

Most traditional flexible packaging is made from multiple layers of different materials that provide sealability, barrier protection, and other functions. But these materials aren’t compostable and can’t be easily separated and directed to the proper recycling stream.

Sustainable Flexible Packaging Materials

Sustainable flexible packaging materials are primarily categorized as recyclable or compostable.

Recyclable materials can be mono films, which are produced from the same or similar polymers, or paper-based materials, both of which can flow into the recycling stream.

Compostable materials can decompose over time, given the proper conditions, and can vary significantly in their structure. Their two main classifications are Industrial Compostable, such as PLA (polylactic acid), and Home Compostable, such as paper or PHA (polyhydroxyalkanoates). Some of these structures are also recyclable.

Sustainable materials will likely continue to develop for several years, with a focus on areas such as seal integrity and gas permeability.

Forming and Sealing Sustainable Packaging Materials

Challenges

A variety of structures with different characteristics are utilized to meet sustainability requirements, and they each can present a unique set of challenges to form and seal packages and maintain production speeds.

These potential issues should be identified and considered as you evaluate options and decide which sustainable materials to test or convert to.

Setup and Components

More precise machine setup and customized sealing jaws, formers, and other components are often required.

By anticipating these factors ahead of time instead of reacting to problems down the line, you can reduce project completion time, decrease costs, and minimize compromises to package quality and productivity.

Working with Greener Corporation

Greener Corporation can work with you and potential material suppliers from the beginning, as you evaluate sustainable options.

At Greener Corp, our packaging machine and material experts understand the unique production challenges that different sustainable structures can present. They will help you identify and implement setup and procedural changes, customized components, or technical services that may be needed.

Future posts and videos in our Sustainability Series will describe the different types of sustainable materials in more detail, explain the specific packaging challenges that each type presents, and outline solutions that can help you successfully test and convert to sustainable materials.

To learn more about optimizing package quality and production speeds with sustainable packaging materials, contact Greener Corporation. We provide integrated parts and technical services worldwide.

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Integrated Parts & Technical Services for Flow Wrappers & Vertical FFS Baggers

Michael Wojtech — Thu, 18 May 2023 13:40:34 +0000

It takes more than just the right cutting, sealing, and forming components to meet your production goals on flow wrappers and vertical baggers. When you work with Greener Corporation, we integrate premium, customized parts with the technical support and services that you need to optimize package quality and productivity.

Problem Resolution

Greener Corp will help you resolve immediate packaging problems, prevent future issues, and discover quality and productivity improvements you may not have thought possible.

Installations

For all our cutting, sealing, and forming parts we offer an installation service option, to ensure optimal set-up and performance from the start.

Line Evaluations

Through line evaluations we analyze your whole packaging process and recommend solutions to solve problems, improve procedures, and implement unrecognized opportunities to improve package quality and productivity.

Evaluations can cover single machines or complete lines and focus on specific issues or provide a current state analysis.

Training

Greener Corporation’s training programs are customized for your packaging conditions and goals on flow wrappers and vertical baggers. We provide classroom and hands-on sessions for machine operators, mechanics, engineers, management, and owners that empower your team to integrate all parts of your packaging process and efficiently produce quality packaging.

Project Development

Our Greener corp technical and engineering staff can help you develop and implement a wide range of package quality, productivity, and cost saving projects such as new film qualifications, new products, and machinery redesigns.

Our solutions-oriented approach at Greener Corp integrates custom designed parts with the technical support that is essential for success, whether your project involves a single packaging machine, full product lines, or regional and international endeavors.

Flexible Packaging Materials Consulting

With the expansion of our Packaging Lab, Greener Corporation provides a broad range of consulting resources to help you select, test, run, and solve problems with sustainable and traditional flexible packaging materials on flow wrappers and vertical baggers.

To discover how integrated parts and technical services can help you improve package quality and productivity, contact Greener Corporation. We provide integrated parts and technical services worldwide.

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Pressure & Heat: Adjustments & Sealing Jaw Designs

Matt Wojtech — Sat, 30 Apr 2022 18:48:14 +0000

This Greener Tech Bite reviews machine adjustments and sealing jaw designs that provide the pressure and heat* required for quality seals. You can consult additional, detailed posts and videos on each topic by clicking the red links or the corresponding images.

Quality seals on flow wrappers & vertical baggers require a combination of time, pressure, and heat, if utilized, that seals across varying thicknesses created by the fin or lap seal, gussets, or other pleats and wrinkles.

With time typically limited by high line speeds, your effective operating range for pressure and heat may be narrow and difficult to maintain. Too little leaves seals open or leaking; too much will split, distort, or damage the seal.

Adjustments

Product Feed & Package Formation

It’s important to consider your full packaging process. Adjustments to product feed and package formation can reduce variations in the size and location of the fin seal, lap seal, or gussets and eliminate extra wrinkles and folds that reduce seal quality.

(Click on the red links or images for detailed posts & videos on each topic.)

Flow Wrapper adjustments include product feed, film alignment and tension, and fin seal formation.

Vertical Bagger adjustments include product flow, roller position, and film drive. Former design and condition are also crucial.

Sealing

Carbon Impressions – Visual inspection of packages and leaker tests indicate problems with pressure or heat, but they don’t tell the full story. Carbon impressions reveal important but less obvious issues such as misaligned serrations, uneven pressure, jaw wear, and product contamination. Make carbon impressions part of your preventative maintenance program.

Knives and Anvils – On machines with rotary jaws, worn and incorrectly adjusted knives and anvils are often overlooked as a cause of leakers, damage, and other sealing problems.

Clearance and Pressure are critical adjustments on flow wrappers. But their differences, and when each should be adjusted, are not always clear.

Sealing Jaw Design

Sealing jaw designs are not universal; your jaws should be custom designed for your film, product, machinery, and running conditions.

(Click on the red links or images for detailed posts & videos on each topic.)

Serrations

The serration profile must transfer consistent pressure and heat across varying thicknesses of film.

Special Features

Special features may be required, such as:

Easy Seal™ FLEX sealing faces to seal across the fin seal.

Design Solutions

This case study demonstrates the benefits of properly designed sealing jaws.

Dura Therm material to ensure consistent sealing temperatures.

Standardization

Do your results vary across different shifts, makes and models of machinery, packaging lines, or locations? You can produce consistent quality seals by establishing standard adjustment procedures, providing training, and by standardizing former and sealing jaw designs.

(Click on the red links or images for detailed posts & videos on each topic.)

Standard Adjustment Procedures and Training

Standard Sealing Jaw Designs

If you need recommendations for machine adjustments and sealing jaw designs that optimize pressure, heat, and seal quality, contact Greener Corporation. We develop and deliver full process solutions, worldwide.

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Running Sustainable Packaging Films on Flow Wrappers & Vertical FFS Baggers

Matt Wojtech — Wed, 12 Jan 2022 18:46:47 +0000

Are you planning to test or convert to sustainable packaging films on your flow wrappers or vertical form-fill-seal baggers? Your current machine set-up and components may not provide quality results with these paper-based, recyclable, or compostable materials.

This Greener Tech Bite outlines steps in your packaging process that you should evaluate and adjust before running these new films. You’ll find links to resources for:

• Machine Set-Up • Standard Operating Procedures

• Sealing Jaw & Former Design • Training

Compared with your current film, sustainable materials may:

• be thicker or stiffer

• be more easily damaged

• or require a different, and perhaps narrower, sealing temperature range

Their machinability and sealability differences can impact everything from film unwind and package formation through to the finished, cut and sealed package.

Package Formation

Sustainable materials may bend and fold differently and be more easily wrinkled or damaged, causing cutting and sealing problems and poor package appearance.

Follow these links to review package formation adjustments and former designs that will help accommodate these differences:

Flow Wrappers

Vertical Baggers

Sealing and Cutting

The set-up and design of your sealing jaws and knives should also be evaluated and adjusted for the new film.

For Flow Wrappers and Vertical Baggers

Carbon Impressions

These resources on carbon impressions will help you identify sealing and cutting problems and develop solutions.

Heat

This Tech Bite will help you maintain more consistent sealing temperatures across the face of your jaws.

Sealing Jaw Design

Your sealing jaws should be designed for the specific characteristics of the new, sustainable material.

Standardization

Standardizing this jaw design across wrappers, lines, and facilities will help ensure consistent, quality results.

More Resources for Flow Wrappers

Clearance & Pressure

Backlash

Knife Set-Up & Sealing

Working With Greener

Greener can work with you at any point on your sustainable film project, even in the early, conceptualization stages. In addition to recommending and delivering revised component designs, we can:

• Provide remote or on-site Technical Service

• Help you develop revised Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs)

• Present Training programs to implement the new SOPs

These case studies, though they do not involve sustainable films, demonstrate the full-process support that Greener can provide:

Film Trials

Package Diagnostics

SOPs & Training

For more technical resources specific to your project variables, contact Greener Corporation. We develop and deliver full process solutions, worldwide.

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Forming & Sealing on Vertical FFS Baggers: 6 Key Design & Set-Up Principles

Matt Wojtech — Thu, 14 Jan 2021 19:15:46 +0000

This Greener Tech Bite, with the help of our partner Kenray Forming, explores six key design and set-up principles to help you identify the source of forming and sealing problems and develop solutions for quality packages.

1. Product Flow

Let’s start at the beginning. Problems occur most often when the product is:

• large in relation to bag size
• inconsistent in size or shape
• lightweight
• oddly shaped
• or with rough outer surfaces

Bottlenecks occur when product strings out as it moves from the inlet chute into the narrower confines of the forming tube. In extreme cases individual product “charges” can bridge together. These product flow issues slow down production speeds, create blockages, and cause leakers when product gets trapped in the seal.

On forming tubes with integral cones the product dose is slightly staggered, so it passes through the bottleneck faster and stays more compact.

2. Forming Set Design

Forming sets should be designed according to your product, package design, machinery, and film specifications. Make sure that this optimal design is accurately and consistently replicated when you order replacement parts or specify formers for multiple machines, lines, or locations.

3. Roller Position

Machine adjustments are also critical for producing quality packages. Misaligned film rollers prevent the film from making full contact with the forming collar, causing wrinkles, creases, and package distortions that reduce shelf appeal and cause seal problems.

4. Film Drive

Poor package quality is caused by film drive issues such as belt adjustment and forming tube alignment.

5. Former Wear and Damage

Wear or damage to the former lip or wing can also distort the package.

6. Sealing

By fine-tuning your forming and filling operations you will improve both package appearance and seal quality.

Leakers
The end seals on packages produced by vertical baggers typically vary in thickness. Most have a lap or a fin seal, and some are designed with gussets. Unintended wrinkles or pleats may, at times, be unavoidable. Leakers, when they occur, often follow channels at the intersections between two and multiple layers of film and at the corners.

Sealing Jaws
Sealing jaws must transfer enough pressure and heat to seal across these channels without crushing, cutting, or distorting the end seal.

• Pressure
In order to create uniform sealing pressure, the serration profile of your sealing jaws should be designed according to your package specifications, machinery, and running conditions.

• Heat
Sealing jaw temperatures are often increased to improve seal quality, but this can create hot spots that overheat and distort the package.

Jaws manufactured from Dura-Therm material provide more responsive, consistent heat transfer across the package to help seal off channel leakers without overheating the film.

• Wear and Damage
Jaws that are worn, damaged, or contaminated with product also create inconsistent pressure and heat transfer that cause seal problems.

To learn more about forming and filling on vertical baggers, contact our partner, Kenray Forming. They provide remote training and consultancy to help you optimize your packaging operations.

For more details on sealing consult the wide variety of posts and videos posted here on our Technical Resource Blog, or contact Greener Corporation. We develop and deliver solutions worldwide.

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