Compact Pharmaceutical Feeder Design

To meet the grow­ing demands of con­tin­u­ous pro­cess­ing in phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal appli­ca­tions and also address sim­i­lar require­ments for quick changeover and clean­ing in batch appli­ca­tions, Cope­ri­on K‑Tron intro­duces the next gen­er­a­tion of its high­ly accu­rate phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal loss-in-weight screw feed­ers at this year’s Inter­phex, April 17–19, 2018, Jacob Jav­its Con­ven­tion Cen­ter in New York City, Booth 2261.
In their booth, Cope­ri­on and Cope­ri­on K‑Tron will focus on both con­tin­u­ous and batch process­es and their newest inno­v­a­tive solu­tions for opti­mal feed­ing and refill accu­ra­cy, while demon­strat­ing how they pro­vide sin­gle source solu­tions for extru­sion, feed­ing and con­vey­ing appli­ca­tions in the phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal and nutraceu­ti­cal indus­tries. They con­tin­ue to work close­ly with phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal and nutraceu­ti­cal com­pa­nies of all sizes, result­ing in smart tech­ni­cal solu­tions such as the new phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal feed­er line, always with an empha­sis on prod­uct qual­i­ty and process safe­ty. Exhibits on dis­play include the new K3-PH loss-in-weight feed­ers (QT20 and QT35), as well as micro-ingre­di­ent feed­er (MT12) with inter­change­able twin and sin­gle screw feed­ing mod­ules, P10 vac­u­um sequenc­ing san­i­tary pow­der receiv­er and the hygien­ic low capac­i­ty ZZB rotary valve, a per­fect design for phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal applications.

New K3-PH line of pharmaceutical loss-in-weight feeders

The new K3-PH feed­er design fea­tures a mod­u­lar con­cept, com­plete with a dras­ti­cal­ly reduced over­all foot­print, thanks to a small­er D4 plat­form scale incor­po­rat­ing the patent­ed and high­ly accu­rate Smart Force Trans­duc­er (SFT) weigh­ing tech­nol­o­gy. The new D4 plat­form scale fea­tures the same state-of-the-art san­i­tary design of the estab­lished Cope­ri­on K‑Tron D5 scale. Smooth, crevice free sur­faces pre­vent deposit of dust and prod­uct residue and enable easy clean­ing. At the heart of the new D4 scale, Cope­ri­on K‑Tron’s patent­ed SFT sin­gle wire weigh­ing tech­nol­o­gy pro­vides a high­ly accu­rate weight sig­nal with a res­o­lu­tion of 1:4,000,000 in 80 ms. The advanced elec­tron­ics include lin­eariza­tion, tem­per­a­ture com­pen­sa­tion, and a dig­i­tal low-pass fil­ter to reduce the effect of plant vibra­tion. The 100% dig­i­tal design elim­i­nates the need for calibration.
The feeder’s mod­u­lar quick change design allows the easy exchange of feed­er types and sizes as well as hop­pers or agi­ta­tors using the same scale & dri­ve for fast adap­ta­tion to new process­es and for­mu­la­tions while also ensur­ing easy clean­ing and main­te­nance. The new design is ide­al for mul­ti feed­er clus­ter­ing in a vari­ety of con­tin­u­ous process­es, includ­ing direct com­pres­sion (CDC), con­tin­u­ous extru­sion, wet and dry gran­u­la­tion, and con­tin­u­ous coat­ing, as well as tra­di­tion­al batch process­es. The new mod­u­lar phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal feed­er design includes sev­er­al inno­v­a­tive mod­i­fi­ca­tions, all engi­neered as a result of in-depth mar­ket stud­ies with end users in the phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal indus­try. The quick change feed­er bowl, agi­ta­tor and screw com­bi­na­tions which can be quick­ly decou­pled from the feed­er dri­ve pro­vide for easy and fast changeover and clean­ing of the feed­ers. By open­ing two clamps the feed­er bowl can be released and replaced by a clean one for run­ning a new prod­uct. The three avail­able Cope­ri­on K‑Tron feed­er types QT20, QT35 and QS60, both twin and sin­gle screw, can be used with the same scale and dri­ve com­bi­na­tion. The redesign of the scale from a hereto­fore round design to a trape­zoid design facil­i­tates an opti­mized mul­ti feed­er arrange­ment with a much small­er foot­print. This is impor­tant and use­ful espe­cial­ly in areas with lim­it­ed space, where mul­ti­ple ingre­di­ents must be fed into one process inlet. In addi­tion, the feed­er bowls and hop­pers fea­ture a new improved seal design for ide­al prod­uct con­tain­ment. The new mod­u­lar con­cept also fea­tures a new­ly devel­oped dri­ve using a ser­vo motor which helps reduce the over­all foot­print and offers a much larg­er turn­down range, includ­ing low feed rates. Mul­ti­ple gear­box changes as in the past are not required any more. The three avail­able feed­er types QT20, QT35 and QS60 are inter­change­able, depend­ing on the prod­uct to be fed, the required feed rates and the nec­es­sary scale res­o­lu­tion as con­tin­u­ous process­es often require mul­ti­ple ingre­di­ents to be fed into the process at dif­fer­ent rates. For an opti­mal Wash-in-Place (WIP) result, every unit has an inte­gral 2 degree pitch facil­i­tat­ing max­i­mum drainage dur­ing the clean­ing process. The new mod­u­lar K3-PH line con­cept is designed to pro­vide for a clus­ter arrange­ment of 6 or more feed­ers to meet these com­plex require­ments. The com­plete line of equip­ment is engi­neered to meet the rigid require­ments of the phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal indus­try, includ­ing strict adher­ence to cGMP guide­lines and stan­dards as well as the use of FDA approved mate­ri­als of construction.
The new Cope­ri­on K‑Tron K3-PH line of phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal design loss-in-weight feed­ers includes proven instru­men­ta­tion, con­trols and opti­mized design options for con­tin­u­ous feed­ing of dif­fi­cult flow­ing phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal excip­i­ents and API’s. Depend­ing on the appli­ca­tion, the new phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal feed­er line can be out­fit­ted with a vari­ety of ancil­lary options includ­ing the inno­v­a­tive Act­i­Flow™ bulk solids acti­va­tor, a mate­r­i­al flow aid for feed­ing dif­fi­cult flow­ing mate­ri­als, as well as Elec­tron­ic Pres­sure Com­pen­sa­tion (EPC). EPC is a unique instru­men­ta­tion pack­age which can opti­mize feed­er per­for­mance in con­tin­u­ous oper­a­tions such as blend­ing, extru­sion, gran­u­la­tion and coat­ing. The phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal feed­ers are avail­able in vol­u­met­ric and gravi­met­ric, sin­gle and twin screw models.

MT12 Micro-Ingredient Feeder: Provides Maximum Accuracy at Minimal Feed Rates

The Cope­ri­on K‑Tron fam­i­ly of Micro-Ingre­di­ent Feed­ers is ide­al for accu­rate­ly feed­ing free flow­ing to dif­fi­cult mate­ri­als at rates as low as 32 grams/hour and as high as 2000 grams/hour. The low rate, micro-ingre­di­ent feed­er line includes inter­change­able MT12 mm and MT16 mm twin screw feed­ing mod­ules or MS12 mm and MS16 mm sin­gle screw feed­er mod­ules. The com­pact feed­er is designed for ease of dis­as­sem­bly, allow­ing fast and easy clean­ing, with options avail­able for auto­mat­ic refill. Typ­i­cal appli­ca­tions include feed­ing jet mills, tablet press­es, con­tin­u­ous extru­sion process­es and any appli­ca­tion where expen­sive micro ingre­di­ents require accu­rate feed­ing. The mod­el on dis­play will be the MT12.

P‑Series Receivers: Solutions for Difficult Material Applications

Cope­ri­on K‑Tron P‑Series receivers pro­vide a san­i­tary solu­tion for dif­fi­cult mate­r­i­al con­vey­ing appli­ca­tions. The san­i­tary design fea­tures include steep cone angles to ensure excel­lent dis­charge and band clamps for quick dis­as­sem­bly. The con­vey­ing prin­ci­ple includes vac­u­um, dilute phase, and dense phase. Con­vey­ing rates vary depend­ing on mod­el, prod­uct char­ac­ter­is­tics and con­vey­ing dis­tances. Typ­i­cal mate­ri­als include tablets, cap­sules, flakes, free-flow­ing to poor­ly flow­ing pow­ders, and mate­ri­als requir­ing gen­tle con­vey­ing. Mod­el on dis­play includes a P10 in mir­ror finish.

Coperion Hygienic / ZZB Rotary Valve for Pharmaceutical Applications

The Cope­ri­on ZZB hygien­ic rotary valve is spe­cial­ly designed for san­i­tary phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal appli­ca­tions requir­ing high hygien­ic stan­dards of meter­ing and dis­charg­ing of phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal pow­ders where fre­quent clean­ing and ease of oper­a­tion is imper­a­tive. This rotary valve offers a high­ly pol­ished sur­face Ra 0.8 µm in and out­side to avoid prod­uct deposits, with all prod­uct sur­faces FDA approved. The valve’s stan­dard extrac­tion device allows the rotor to be eas­i­ly removed from the hous­ing and easy to open tri-clamp flange con­nec­tions at both inlet and out­let sim­pli­fy instal­la­tion and main­te­nance. There is a large inlet for max­i­mum capac­i­ties. The out­board bear­ings are sep­a­rat­ed from prod­uct through a drop out open­ing, with opti­mal purged shaft seals. The stan­dard ZZB offers pres­sure dif­fer­en­tial up to 3 psi [0.2 bar(g)] with 15 psi [1 bar(g)] as an option. The ZZB is avail­able in sizes DN 80 and 100 (inlet and out­let) and is suit­able for use in Ex-Zones, inside 0.2, out­side zone 1.21.