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At the Fakuma show this month in Germany, Netstal (U.S. office in Florence, Ky.) will unveil a world premiere of a system for coinjection (sandwich) molding of three-layer coffee capsules with in-mold labeling (IML). The PP/ EVOH/PP capsules provide barrier to oxygen, light, and moisture to preserve the coffee’s aroma. Current single-layer capsules of PP or PLA require secondary packaging for barrier protection.

Produced in a four-cavity test mold from Fostag of Switzerland, the capsules weigh just 1.35 g. They have an overall wall thickness of 0.4 mm, with two PP layers of 0.17 mm and an EVOH barrier layer of 0.06 mm. They will be molded on an all-electric Netstal Elion 1200 press (120 metric tons) with a vertically mounted auxiliary injector from Plasdan of Portugal.

The IML automation is provided by Beck Automation of Switzerland, which recently completed a 32-cavity version of this system. “With such small package sizes, the challenge lies in label-inserting precision,” says Nino Zehnder, head of sales for Beck Automation.

“We are talking about very small labels and ultra-lightweight components” at very high output rates. Overall cycle time is around 4.9 sec.