Driving efficiency in washer and oven innovations
Latest generation VMI washer
Evert van de Weg visits VMI Group’s site in Epe, the Netherlands
Epe is a relatively small village in the Eastern part of the Netherlands. It is located in the middle of meadows and extensive woods. Driving to the VMI (Veluwse Machine Industrie) Group premises on narrow rural roads, you are confronted with an expansive modern series of white buildings, surrounded by hundreds of cars. Some years ago, another new building was added to the premises to cope with constant growth, all carefully embedded in the surrounding nature. In Epe, VMI employs around 1,000 people out of the 1,800 people working for VMI around the world.
Founded in 1945, the company became active in the Dutch dairy industry by the supply of a.o. stainless steel tanks. The company also helped to rebuild the Dutch railway network after World War II. In 1963, VMI entered the rubber and tyre industry and began manufacturing production systems for the rubber industry. The company is a worldwide leading player in producing machinery for making car tyres.
In 1973, VMI took another major step with the manufacture of can washers for two-piece DWI cans. When cans emerge from the bodymaker/ trimmer, they are hot, wet and dirty and covered with lubricants, coolants and metal fines. Before they can be printed (beverage cans) or coated (tinplate steel food cans), they need to be washed in huge integrated washers, capable today of washing approximately 3,000 cans per minute. The washer is the largest piece of equipment in the can making line – commonly more than 30 metres long.
After the washing operation, the two-piece beverage and food cans must be dried. VMI supplies adequate dry-off ovens to do this. A transfer unit transfers the cans from the washer onto the oven belt.
Gerrit Brilman, Dutchman and at the time, project manager on behalf of can maker Thomassen & Drijver – Verblifa, remembers working well with VMI. He says, “We worked closely together with our licensor, Continental Can Company, and the European can makers, Schmalbach-Lubeca and Metal Box, to get two-piece can making lines running in Europe in various plants. In the early 1970s, VMI obtained, through an American commissioner, a license from American company, Cincinnati Industrial Machinery, for the production of can washers.
“Cincinnati Industrial Machinery had already built several can washers in the US for various can makers. We worked fruitfully together with VMI and, in 1974, we started to produce two-piece DWI beverage cans on a large scale. We then began working closely with VMI for many future projects all over Europe.”
Movements in the market
I am meeting Johan Jonkman, sales manager, Wilko Vaandrager, project manager, and Luuk Broers, mechanical engineer, in their modern office. When asked about VMI’s position today in the global market for washers and dry-off ovens, Johan Jonkman comments: “We certainly belong to the top class of that market. There are a few other companies that are active in that same market, namely Cincinnati, ITS, Greenbank and Stolle.
“Where we concentrated on Europe in the first years of our existence, we now have a worldwide presence. I think by now everybody in the can making industry knows VMI.” Like in all can making technologies, much has changed since VMI installed its first washer/oven combination in the early 1970s.
Jonkman comments, “You will hardly recognise a washer/oven combination from the 70s if you compare with the modern ones. There is a world of difference between them. There are still some old colossuses in two-piece can plants, still in full operation, and in some cases seriously overhauled, but so much has changed in the design that they are incredibly outdated.
“The absolute number one priority in the last few years has, of course, been sustainability. The improvements come down to aspects like water, energy and chemicals consumption, better insulation, use of energy from other sources (like residual energy from other equipment), better pre- heating, etc. In our R&D centre here in Epe, we are constantly searching for new improvements. And I can tell you that we have a lot of them in the pipeline,” he teases.
“During the coronavirus pandemic, when many can makers all over the world drastically extended their beverage and food can capacity, owing to a huge surge in consumer demand, our lead times amounted to more than one year. Today, now that the markets have normalised again, the lead time for a combination of washer and oven is around seven months,” said Jonkman.
Latest generation VMI dry-off oven
Monitoring developments
VMI is a global supplier of can washers and ovens, and has supplied all major can makers, including Ball, Crown, Canpack and Ardagh, as well as many local independent companies in the Middle East and Asia. Jonkman comments, “Of course we are highly present in Europe as we grew up from the 1970s in the slipstream of the quickly developing beverage can market. But we also have a solid reputation in Asia. We opened a plant in 1996 for assembling washers and ovens in the Chinese town of Yantai. VMI is less present in North America, as there are already three local suppliers there.”
All three gentlemen emphasise how sustainability dominates the company’s agenda.
Luuk Broers says, “In earlier times you saw that can makers simply got rid of the hot air generated in the dry-off oven by blowing it out of the roof. Today, re-use of that hot air and the use of minimal water in the washer is critical. But washing without water is a no-go and isn’t possible without a minimum of chemicals. It is a question of looking for the limits of the process.”
Vaandrager continues, “What we find out is that you cannot win much anymore in the dry-off oven itself, but what we have found in the last few years is that you can be competitive in the process before the cans go into the oven. The amount of water on the cans coming out of the washer can vary, and for every litre of water you of course need extra energy to dry.”
Jonkman agrees with Vaandrager and adds, “This goes of course also for the process step before the washer. The less lubricant remaining on the cans after leaving the bodymaker/trimmer, the more efficient the washing/drying process can become.” Broers concludes: “We see that the vendors of cuppers, bodymakers and trimmers have a strong drive to minimise the amount of lubricants on the cans. So what we see is that the pressure to make the whole production line for two-piece cans as efficient and sustainable as possible is very strong indeed.”
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