Over the last few weeks lots of concerned customers have contacted Bernd Pauls, KHS service sales support manager. “The big rise in energy prices is making the beverage industry very nervous. Our customers – and especially those in Europe – are really worried about the continuing secure supply of natural gas and electricity. They’re now looking for economical ways of ensuring the energy supply for their machine parks in the long term.” As an experienced service specialist, Pauls knows that there is no general formula here. “Each bottler has different requirements and challenges. In close cooperation with our customers, we thus work to find specific remedies that are perfectly tailored to the current and future needs of the respective company.”
Various conversion packages for KHS shrink tunnels
To this end, KHS has put together an extensive tool kit of conversion variants. Taking the shrink tunnel as an example, Pauls outlines the flexible options available. “Our customers can opt for conversion from one source of energy to another – from natural gas to electricity or liquid gas, for instance. They also have the option of switching the system between two types of gas or flexibly converting it to electricity. Conversion back to a gas supply can then be performed by the customer as required.” This significantly reduces dependence on a single source of energy and increases the security of supply.
The conversion variants greatly differ in their nature and complexity. “Some are carried out by our experts just once; others are conversions that provide reversible setup options,” Pauls explains. Conversions are available for practically all existing shrink tunnels and are installed by KHS specialists specifically trained for the job. There is usually no change in machine control for the operating personnel. With the reversible option the setup is changed by the customer either digitally in a matter of minutes using a selector switch on the HMI or by changing a module over (this takes just a few hours). “The customer’s engineers are of course thoroughly trained in module changeovers by our expert colleagues,” says Pauls.
