The use of PET is steadily gaining market share in food, home care and personal care (FHPC) markets traditionally dominated by HDPE and PP and is expected to grow by an average of 3% for all three sectors until 2020.

Within these highly FHPC competitive markets, Sidel's new SteadyEdge base provides opportunities to accelerate the take-up of PET containers. It is designed to meet the challenge of producing flat, oval and rectangular containers in PET, which all require a specific production process that delivers the optimum material distribution of PET to achieve a top quality package.

The new base technology offers the possibility to create innovative and attractive PET package designs to differentiate brands while also ensuring bottle stability and cost-efficient production.

It is currently in use by customers in different parts of the world, with over 200 million containers already produced, and will shortly also be available for Sidel Matrix blowing machines.

Smarter blowing and quick changeover  

The specific sharp base design is achieved using the new Sidel patented base mould system: the Base OverStroke System (Boss). Boss is a piston activated in the blowing phase to stroke the base. This mechanical element allows for the raising and lowering of the base during the bottle-forming process independent of the opening and closing of the two half-shells of the mould. Boss provides flexible and versatile production with the option to implement quick mould changeovers and ensure maximum production uptime. A Boss-to-Boss changeover can be performed in just 3 minutes; Boss-to-other can be performed in 11 minutes. Easy to implement and to retrofit, Sidel's new Boss solution is fully compatible with Sidel universal blowing machines.

Creative and distinctive package  

With SteadyEdge, brands will appear exactly as intended. It provides producers within the FHPC markets opportunities to differentiate their products and increase their market share with PET. It makes it possible to achieve premium-quality containers in PET, with sharper edges which have a radius as little as only 1 mm, compared to a previous minimum of 2.5 mm. These sharper edges actually increase design freedom and facilitate the production of more elegant containers with bases which are less curved. They offer particular marketing opportunities for containers with complex shapes and large labelling surfaces. The technology also ensures maximum container quality by way of accurate processing, optionally reinforced by a monitoring system to visually control the base movement on individual blowing stations.

More stable package for optimum uptime  

The sharper edges possible on the package are used to effectively flatten and increase the “standing ring” area of the base, offering maximum production efficiency and performance. They make the package much more stable, preventing unwanted rocking and reducing the possibility of containers being knocked over. The application of SteadyEdge to any PET flat bottle design can enhance the package's stability by as much as 35%. It improves reliability on the production line as packages are far less likely to fall while they are being conveyed between various machines. This results in fewer costly stoppages and greatly improved uptime. The increased stability is also beneficial on both the supermarket shelf and in the home.

A cost-efficient and sustainable production  

This innovative packaging solution optimises productivity and low total cost of ownership (TCO) while product quality and reliability are maintained to a high standard. Benefits include lightweighting possibilities of up to 10% through the improved material stretch on the base. When the standard base is the bottle feature that requires more blowing pressure for perfect shaping, it can be replaced by the SteadyEdge base. This allows blowing pressure to be reduced, decreasing energy consumption by up to 20%. The solution has been achieving higher output rates up to 10% faster - from 1,800 bottles per hour per mould for flat containers with standard base to 2,000 bottles per hour per mould with SteadyEdge. Such greatly improved line performance might typically contribute to a possible return on investment (ROI) in less than a single year.