Analysis of Aseptic Cold Filling Technology for PET Bottles

With the booming worldwide packaging of PET bottles, filling of juices and soft drinks is progressing from hot filling to aseptic cold filling. According to the constant pursuit of beverage quality by the market and consumers, the share of the hot filling market will be gradually reduced, and replaced by aseptic cold filling with promising prospects.

Aseptic cold filling technology advantages

1. Filling at normal temperature, minimizing the heating time of the beverage, the product has little vitamin loss, rich nutrition, and maintains the original flavor of the beverage product.

2, without the use of preservatives and any other additives, can make the product have a better freshness, the greatest degree of reduction of natural fruit flavor and color, to provide consumers with the most natural green food.

3, compared to hot filling, packaging materials can reduce the cost of 1/2 to 1/3, is conducive to competition in the market.

4, because it is a normal temperature filling, bottle type is not like the hot filling bottle like to prevent the bottle from heat deformation and monotonous, companies can freely design bottle type, enhance the company's brand image and enhance market competitiveness.

5, aseptic cold filling for a wider range of products, such as mixed tea, milk tea, pure milk and protein-containing beverages can be used for production, while hot filling can not.

Aseptic Cold Filling Equipment for PET Bottles

1, PET aseptic cold filling line process.

It is the key to the aseptic cold filling of PET bottles that the correct sterilization of the product and the aseptic processing of filling equipment, filling environment, empty bottles, and bottle caps are achieved. The entire filling process is operated in an isolation device and its aseptic technique reaches D6 (almost no microorganisms present). All equipment, articles, and even spaces that come into contact with the product are strictly sterilized.

2, the bottle disinfection.

According to the volume or source of the bottle, it can be sprayed with steam to spray the disinfectant evenly to the inner wall of the bottle to achieve the disinfection of the inner wall of the bottle, or the method of soaking and sterilizing is adopted, that is, the empty bottle is filled with the disinfectant first, and then the set Soaking time to achieve complete sterilization. The outside of the bottle is sprayed with disinfectant for many times to thoroughly sterilize the outside of the bottle.

3, through the optimal combination of water, steam, disinfectant to ensure maximum energy conservation.

4, imported high-quality stainless steel pipes, fittings and sanitary pumps, the United States PALL filter, etc. constitute a disinfectant recovery filtration recycling system.

Bottle cap conveying and sterilizing device

Sterilization of caps is very important in aseptic filling. It is thoroughly sterilized by means of immersion. The proper sterilisation of the caps is ensured by a reasonable setting of temperature, concentration, time and level. The bottle caps are lifted by a chain-type full-enclosed lifting conveyor. The manager's cover machine aligns the cover and sterilizes them through a spiral chute, using a combination of soaking and spraying, and then rinses with sterile water and then blows with sterile air. Dry, sent to the capping machine via a fully enclosed conveyor chute, maintaining a positive pressure of 100 degrees of cleanliness in the channel.

Disinfection, flushing, filling, capping three-in-one unit

With a modular design, the four-in-one unit is composed of a sterilizer, a bottle rinser, a filling machine and a capping machine. The upper part of the tabletop is sealed with a cover and a platform structure conforming to the hygiene standards is adopted.

The flushing machine uses a plug-in type nozzle, which can be washed and drained several times in sterile water so that the residual concentration is less than 0.1 ppm. The filling valve uses non-contact flow meter type quantitative filling to effectively prevent secondary pollution. The use of electromagnetic flowmeters for imported filling valves, with high measuring accuracy; automatic false bottle mechanism is set, and it is automatically installed in CIP cleaning and SIP sterilization.

The capping machine adopts a magnetic suspension type capping head and adopts a capping method and a capping method. Rinse the bottle screw with sterile water before capping. After the cap is closed, flush the bottle with sterile water.

The use of the bottle-holder transport method is characterized by the fact that when filling two different bottles, if the bottle diameter is the same, it is not necessary to change the format of the delivery, thereby reducing the downtime.

Aseptic isolation technology

The aseptic isolation device is a guarantee of the aseptic environment of the filling, and the special sealing technology ensures that the isolation device has a degree of cleanliness of 100 degrees. Its characteristics are:

1. The device is directly installed on the equipment. It is equipped with multiple insulating gloves and isolating transfer devices directly on the surrounding board to adjust the production steps or troubleshoot without damaging the aseptic environment.

2. Aseptic isolation devices allow pneumatic, electric, and drive devices to be effectively isolated from the sterile environment, and are easy to maintain without affecting the operation of the sterile environment.

3, the traditional "clean room" is eliminated, the operator does not need to wear special work clothes.

4. It is the smallest size sterile room. Because the surface area is reduced, the filtered air volume is reduced, so the operating cost is reduced.

5. The positive pressure in the isolator means that the differential pressure with the outdoor is 10 to 20 Pa to ensure that the surrounding air cannot enter the isolation chamber. The corners of the isolation chamber are designed to facilitate cleaning, leaving no dead ends.

6, can be 48 to 72 hours continuous operation without the need for environmental disinfection and sterilization.

External sterilization (COP) of filling equipment

The external sterilization of the filling equipment ensures that no external bacteria are introduced into the product during the filling process. The imported foam-based external foam cleaning system (COP) is used according to the corresponding procedures, such as "sterile water-foam disinfection-sterile water-alkaline disinfection-sterile water-alkaline disinfection-sterile water - Acidic Disinfection - Sterile Water program sterilizes the filling valve, capping head, star wheel assembly, equipment surface, interior surface of the isolator, etc., for a certain period of time.

The sterilization interval is performed continuously for 48 to 72 hours without the cover being open.

Cleaning (CIP) and Sterilization (SIP) of the internal and material contact parts of the filling equipment

The filling equipment is equipped with an independent CIP cleaning system in place. If the production is stopped after the production is stopped for a few hours, the material channels, material cylinders, filling valves and other material channels must be cleaned with acid, alkali and sterile water immediately after the production is stopped. (CIP) to ensure the cleanliness of the material channels. When the production is resumed, the material passages must first be disinfected, rinsed with sterile water, and then steam sterilized to ensure a sterile environment for the material passages.

Sterilization of other auxiliary systems

In order to ensure that the product is produced under aseptic conditions, the sterilization of the auxiliary systems is also very important to prevent the bacteria from being brought into the product due to these systems, such as sterile water lines, sterile air lines, etc.