Technical Description of the Conversion Kit

The MaxiCrown Conversion Kit can be installed in most types of crowners and other sealing machines with capacities up to 60 000 bottles per hour. Our reference lists are covering more than 100 installations of the MaxiCrown Conversion Kit. Our customers confirm equal reliability and efficiency as for crown corks.

The Conversion Kit is designed for efficient sealing of different types of ring pull caps as MaxiCrown, Ring Crown and Rip Cap of sizes 26, 33, 38 and 42 mm. The MaxiCrown Conversion Kit has been carefully adapted to the new MaxiCrown cap, made of aluminium shell and PE ring (in Japan named Maxi-PGC), to provide optimal sealing. The sealing machines are manufactured and supplied by us (i.e., MaxiCrown Sealing Machines AB in Sweden), that means by technicians with many years of experience from this specific sealing technique.

Maxi Crown			Rip Cap		RingCrown	MaxiCap
26 mm	33 mm	38 mm	26 mm	42 mm	26 mm	26 mm

The Conversion Kit can be installed either in lines at use with fillers or in new sealing machines in cooperation with the actual manufacturer of filling lines.

The optimal flexibility and use of the whole filling line will be achieved by installing the MaxiCrown Conversion Kit in a separate turret, allowing the options of sealing glass bottles with crown corks and glass and plastic bottles with MaxiCrown.

By specializing on MaxiCrown sealing machines and making use of our long experience of this technique, we are able to offer our customers competitive prices and secured quality.

Conversion kit components

1. Cap Transporter Unit
The caps are filled into a storing bin and transported from there in pipes by air to the hopper.

2. Hopper
The hopper is positioned immediately above the turret or on top of the crown cork hopper. Different sizes of hoppers are offered according to required capacity.

3. Cap Chute and Applier
After orienting the caps in the hopper into correct positions, the cap outlet is feeding the caps into the chute with the ring behind. The cap chute is kept full with caps. Each bottle passing the cap applier is catching a cap with the bottle neck.

4. Sealing Head
The top pressure applied on the sealing head forms the cap to the bottle neck. During the initial phase of sealing the Maxi Crown cap is kept in position on the bottle top and centered in the head by the inner plunger. By the final downward movement of the sealing head the cap is formed to the bottle neck. The cap fits tightly under the locking ring and provides good sealing and reliability. The sealing heads are easily mounted on existing sealing elements. Replacement heads are made available for repair and cleaning, if requested.

5. Electric Control Unit
The electric control system is integrated with the main PLC of the filling line, automatically stopping and starting the filling and the sealing machines at any relevant disturbance. Sensors are controlling and coordinating the feed of the caps. The electric control system is installed in a Main Cabinet and an Operator's Control Panel. These cabinets are made from stainless steel.

Cap chute and cap applier

Hopper	Sealing head glass bottles	Sealing head plastic bottles	Electric control Unit - Main Cabinet	Electric control Unit - Control Panel

Sealing Performance

Capacity
The MaxiCrown Conversion Kit allows the same sealing speed and degree of reliability as standard crowners. At a number of installations MaxiCrown has been running with a speed of 60 000 bottles per hour. We are testing some improvements allowing us to increase max capacity to 70 000 bottles per hour.

High efficiency
Breweries that have had the opportunity to compare both systems have found that the production efficiency of the Maxi Crown in the Conversion Kit is equal to sealing crown corks in standard crowners.

Early application
In the Maxi Crown Conversion Kit the cap is applied on the bottle top at an early stage before it goes into the sealing machine. This ensures that the content of the bottle is protected from contamination during the critical moment when the sealing head is lowered over the bottle.

Plastic bottles
The Conversion Kit has been adapted for one way or refillable plastic bottles, PET or PEN. The sealing is made in special heads reducing the top load on the bottles to less than 15 kg. MaxiCrown is carefully crimped in under the locking ring without damaging the plastic neck finish, which happens at sealing with crown corks. The capacity achieved for the sealing of MaxiCrown on plastic bottles is 42 - 45 000 bottles per hour - this capacity is limited by the feeding of the plastic bottles, not by MaxiCrown Conversion Kit.

Testing of carbonation retention
Both short and long-term carbonation retention tests are without exception within the established DIN-norms for crown corks. Maxi Crown is also suitable for tunnel pasteurization.

Installation and Service

MaxiCrown provides the following Manuals:

• Technical Manual, Spare Parts and Maintenance.
• Operator's Manual.
• Manual for the Electric Control System.

Installation is made on the consumer's request

• with the filler in lines at use, or
• in cooperation with the manufacturer of the actual turret at his site.

Most Spare Parts are supplied from stock. The detailed Technical Manual provides all information required for Preventing and Regular Maintenance. At request maintenance assistance will be provided to be charged to actual terms.

Lab Sealing Machine.
MaxiCrown makes handy Lab Sealing Machines available to brewers for internal test purposes. The Lab Machines can be purchased or temporarily borrowed.

References

A list of reference installations can be found on our reference page.