Recognizing the significance of batch and date coding equipment is essential for ensuring product quality and compliance with industry standards. Technological advancements have led to a wide range of coding machines, empowering businesses to enhance production efficiency and precision.
Why Do You Need a Date Coding Machine?
Date coding machine has been around for many years. Technology has diversified so much you probably will get overwhelmed by the number of choices you can take for your companies. However, before you even consider buying one, why exactly do you need a coding machine?
Your Products Need It
In whatever sector you are, be it in food and beverages, industrial and manufacturing, or pharmaceuticals, the government requires you to put various labels in it, including the information of the batch your products include in.
What date do your products were produced and ready for distribution? What line was it produced in? These are two major things that need to be included in your packaging. Why?
The regulation stated that if there were ever a need for a recall, they would need you to recall the ones having problems—how do you trace the ones having trouble? By recalling the batch number and the date you put on the packaging of your products.
The next Question Comes Then, How Should You Put Those Labels on Products?
Choosing the right date coding machine is essential for businesses to ensure compliance with industry regulations while maintaining efficient operations. A well-selected date coding machine not only meets the regulatory requirements for batch and date labeling but also enhances production speed and accuracy. This, in turn, reduces the risk of costly recalls due to labeling errors, ensuring that products are accurately and consistently marked with the necessary information. Whether your business is in food and beverages, pharmaceuticals, or manufacturing, a reliable date coding machine is a critical investment in quality control and operational efficiency.
A coding machine is an answer. It prints both batch and date coding onto products quite easily, with options like whether you would need it to print continuously at high speed or not for instance. There are many types of it and this article would walk you through the basics of batch and coding machines.
See Also: Why do manufacturers need Coding and Marking Printers in Order to Stay Up with Industry 4.0?
Types of Batch and Coding Machines for Your Production Needs
Based on how you would handle the machine, there are three types of these machines. Each type would have advantages for your specific field of the sector.
1. Manual
Manual batch and date coding printers need an operator to put them into use. This operator would need to type the batch and the date of the product into the machine. He also needs to hand-held the machine and prints it for the product.
This particular machine is good for products that do not need a high-speed line in the process. A manual batch and date printer is best for a small production company with limited distribution area and batch.
2. Semi-Automatic
Semi-automatic machine does not need your operator to handheld the machine—the machine would do it on its own. The catch however, is that the products will need to be fed to the machine instead.
This printer suits middle scale production with product feeder on standby. While the manual feeding would be a little bit problematic, the machine will print automatically after an operator set the batch and date it needs.
3. Fully-Automatic
Fully automatic machine is by far the most sophisticated as it doesn’t need an operator and the product doesn’t need to be put right in front of the machine for the machine to print. This machine would print consistently and continuously in the exact same place from one product to another in.
An operator is only needed in this printer when a change in the product or code is needed. No operator intervention means this printer can print continuously 24/7 without down-time.
An automatic date coding machine is best suited to large scale production with an automated production line. The accuracy would lessen the risk of a recall because of a coding errors. Even advantageous is the fact that it can print on high speed, making your production line is even more time-efficient.
After understanding about the types of handling coding machine, these printers differ too in terms of the contact towards the products. This comes up because some packaging does not have flat surface that printer head usually come in contact with. Thus, here are two types of coding machine based on the contact.
Contact
Coding machine with contact to the product is the more traditional printer. If your packages have flat surfaces like cardboards or flat plastic, the printer head would came in contact with the surface and print on it.
The more sophisticated contact machine usually are for rubber or metal codes where you need thermal printer over it to stamp (instead of traditionally print using ink) over the surface. One machine that has this, for instance, is the Thermal Transfer Overprinting or is commonly called (TTO).
Non-Contact
The non-contact printer is more commonly used in various sectors in industry nowadays with its flexibility in printing. Whether the surface on which it prints is flat or curved, non-contact printer has the ability to reach on them.
The ones available in the market right now are Continuous Inkjet (CIJ) printers and Thermal Inkjet (TIJ) printer. Continuous inkjet, for one, is widely used in food and beverages sector and also industrial and manufacturing.
An example for this printer is Linx 8900. Fully automatic, you can operate it even when you are a distance away from the machine with cloud base from Linx.
See Also: Key Components Of New Linx 8900 CIJ: Efficiency is Yours!
To Conclude
Batch and date labels on products are required, thus they need coding machines. There are many types of batch and date coding machines, some of which are more traditional and suited for small production industry, whilst others are suited for more of a high and large scale production. Whatever sector your company is, coding is important and that is why knowing more about it is necessary.
