The cap pick off is very important component during the capping application. This is the section on the filler where the caps are placed on the bottle. If this section on the filler is not set up properly, the capping application will result with various issues; cocked caps, caps popping off bottles and even damaged bottles. Once the pick off is set, this should not be changed. Unfortunately, shorter or taller bottles run on the same filler lines depending on the dairy and capping issues do occur. We will touch on how the pick of should be set up and a couple of different problems if it is set up the wrong way.

The chute is full of caps and the production day is ready to begin. The tension needed in the fingers that hold the caps in the pick off, need to hold a chute full of caps. The caps in the pick off should be set is such a way that the cap ratchet ring hits the middle of the bottle ratchet. This allows for an easy placement on the cap to the bottle. The following issues occur when the pick of is set in two different settings with the cap.

High Setting

If the cap pick off is too high, the cap will hit the top of the bottle neck finish. Hitting the top of the bottle finish will flip the caps off the bottle and not cap. Depending on the speed of the capping unit the, large quantities of caps will become useless because they were misapplied and landed on the floor. This in turn, costs the company money.

Low Setting

If the cap pick off is too low, the caps will hit the bottom of the bottle neck finish. Hitting the bottom of the bottle neck finish will force the caps to move forward and not engage the cap thread to the bottle thread. This will just push the cap away from the capping unit resulting in misapplied caps landing on the floor which become useless. This again costs the company money.

Your Blackhawk Field Engineer can assist in walking through the correct set up procedures to allow the pick off to be corrected if the pick off is not working properly. This may take a little time and patience but will pay off in the end.