Hi, I'm a newbie into the openbuildsworld. The system and the openess are fantastic. I'm the owner of a small brewery in Belgium and I was looking for prototyping a casepacker. A Case packer would pick 24 or 12 bottles of beer and place them into an empty box. I think the systems overhere should be able to do this. The only thing I'm a bit affraid of is the payload. 24 bottles weigh about 14 kg (30 pounds). Are these systems strong enough to handle such a payload? On what should I pay extra attention? Any suggestions of previous builds i can use or study? A rough example of such a big case packer, this project should be much smaller, but the principle stays the same : Kind regards, Thijs
I certainly think it is possible. You may be limited to 12 bottles at a time so if speed is of the essence you may need to set up a second machine for front half/back half loading. As for payload, you need to think more on the lines of working load on the system. Working load in this case would not only include the payload but the weight of the lifting head and any cables and hoses supported by it as well as the weight of the Z-axis because the whole axis will need to be moving up and down. This is why I suggest 12 bottles as a starting point. Beyond that all I can suggest is keeping your spans as short as possible and use lots of wheels with as wide of a spacing as possible. You might also check into the industrial safety codes in your country to make what you intend to do will comply with the regulations.
