Background

Merom Farms is a Greenhouse operation that produces a variety of sweet bell peppers. The facility also houses a grading and packaging line where the peppers are washed, graded and placed into boxes. Inkjet printers are used to print the pepper`s size, variety, packaging date and grower information on the box. The contents of the box are identified by a barcode that is affixed to the box at the grading station and the information can change from one box to next. Each box needs to be printed on both front and on the back.

Problem Situation

A printing system, previously installed by a different company, exhibited numerous problems such as:

• Poor or illegible print quality
  
  The supplied printheads could not produce the print quality required by Merom Farms and their customers.
  
  
• Missed or misprinted boxes
  
  The decoding of the applied barcodes was unreliable and the control system would often either not print at all or print wrong information.
  
  
• No system feedback to the user
  
  The control system had no feedback such as alarms or error logging resulting in Merom Farms being unable to troubleshoot incorrect or missing print due to:
  
  a) A wrong barcode being placed on the box
  b) A missing barcode or one that was placed in the wrong location
  c) A barcode being incorrectly decoded
  
  This ambiguity made resolving the problem difficult and time consuming.
  
  
• Printing on only one side of the box
  
  Even though there were two printheads installed with the system, only one functioned correctly. In order to have print on both sides of the box, the box had to be manually removed from the grading line after passing the printheads and then placed back on the grading line upstream of the printheads so that the other side of the box could be printed.
  
  
• Poor customer support
  
  

Z-Tecs Solution

Z-Tec Automation Systems Inc. has been successfully designing and installing similar applications for years. Drawing on our extensive experience and excellent working relationship with several inkjet manufacturers, we were able to propose a custom designed solution, which met with Merom Farms criteria.

The solution included several inkjets from different manufacturers with
Z-Tec personnel working with Merom Farms personnel to select the best one for the application. The selection criteria included cost, ease of maintenance and quality of print. After finalizing the hardware, Z-Tec personnel created a custom software package designed to Merom Farm specifications and integrated the components into the final Inkjet Control System (ICS).

Z-Tec Automation Systems Inc. personnel installed the ICS on schedule prior to grading line start-up and without disruption to Merom Farms operation. The installation, including commissioning, was completed in two days.

The newly installed Z-Tec Automation Systems Inc. custom designed Inkjet Control System remedied all of the problems experienced by the old system and includes the following features:

• The new system produces high quality, easy to read print on the front and back of boxes without additional handling. The custom software solution produced for Merom Farms is built on a proven, thoroughly tested base platform that Z-Tec Automation Systems Inc. has successfully used in other similar installations. This base platform reduces development time, avoids costly modifications and offers the ability to expand the basic system with low cost optional features.
  
  
• The ICS tracks errors, such as missing or improperly read barcodes for display on the screen. Basic real-time shift reporting is also a part of the basic system.
  
  
• The installed ICS uses two high-density print heads to print on opposite sides of a box. The control system utilizes a timing unit and photocells to track the movement of the boxes. The timing unit allows for variation in line speed without reducing the quality and legibility of the print. The Windows based ICS software component is simple and intuitive to use with a powerful set of features.
  
  
• Z-Tec Automation Systems Inc. personnel are proud of the quality of service we provide. During installation, Merom Farms requested additional software features in the ICS software and we provided and tested the changes within a few days.
  
  

View Z-Tec`s Inkjet Control System in Action:

MPG Format

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ICS in Action 1	(44 sec. ~ 7.6 Mb)
ICS in Action 2	(50 sec. ~ 8.6 Mb)

QuickTime Format

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ICS in Action 2	(44 sec. ~ 10.4 Mb)
ICS in Action 2	(50 sec. ~ 11.5 Mb)

A demo version of Z-Tec Automation Systems Inc. Inkjet Control System is available. Please contact us to obtain the ICS demo program.