Carton allows sterilisation of chunky products after packaging

The process allows products packed in combisafe to be stored for up to two years without quality losses, without refrigeration and without the use of preservatives, SIG Combibloc said in announcing the carton system yesterday at Anuga FoodTech.

The UK company is marketing the carton as an alternative to the glass and tin cans normally used to package vegetables and fruit products. It's a new market for the company, whose main targets has been the dairy and drinks sectors.

The ready made food market is one of the growing segments in the food processing industry, which is targeting consumers who are generally spending less time on meal preparation and are on the lookout for products they can prepare at home quickly and easily.

A more recent trend is the growing markets for minimally processed foods and drinks, ones with fewer additives and preservatives but that still meet demands for safer products.

The Combisafe packs makes it possible to fill chunky products such as vegetables, fruit, ready-cooked meals, stews into carton packs and subsequently sterilise them in an autoclave, the company said.

The combisafe carton pack is made of cardboard, polypropylene and aluminium. The combination creates the prerequisite for thermal treatment in an autoclave.

Each layer functions to protecte the product during the heat treatment. The inner polypropylene layer is the liquid barrier. The outer polypropylene layer protects it from external contamination and ensures that the composite material can withstand the high temperature and moisture during autoclaving.

The cardboard and aluminium protects the contents from light, external aromas and oxygen.

The opened-up Combisafe carton sleeves are sealed ultrasonically after the filling process.

The printed and coated sleeves for Combisafe have a complete top perforation and are sealed with longitudinally before being stacked on pallets for delivery to the filling company.

There the cartons are filled in a high-speed filling machine from SIG Combibloc. During filling the carton packs are lifted with a suction device. Then they are opened up to form a rectangle and pushed on to a mandrel.

After this the base of the carton pack is activated with hot air, pre-folded and sealed with specially shaped pressing elements.

The pressing process gives the carton pack a curved-in base for stability.

Then the top is folded along the grooves to guarantee exact formation of the top after filling. Then the product is filled into the carton pack in several steps. First the pumpable products are filled in, followed by the pourable foods. Finally liquids can be added to the carton pack if required.

The line is modular, allowing manufacturers to run up to four lanes of the filling machine and control the output, which can reach up to 12,000 packages per hour. Additional filling machines can be added to the line to increase output.

Changing the volume and product can be completed in a few minutes as long as the base crosssection is the same, SGI said. Labelling and design changes can be carried out without any interruption of the production process.

All sides of the rectangular carton pack can be used to present product information and decorative features.

Up to 2,160 cartons packs with a volume of 400 ml can be stacked on one Euro pallet.

Jütro Konservenfabrik, a subsidiary of Hamburg-based I. Schroeder, is SIG's first customer for the new packaging system.

The company intends to launch a chunky sauce range later this year.

"It allows us to fill different products on one and the same machine," Jütro stated in a press release. "The size and quantity of chunky ingredients can be varied. Furthermore, the décor can be changed without any break in the production process."​