AUTOMATED PARTS WASHER SYSTEM
Sunnyday Group makes flexible packaging companies more profitable. Everything from overhauling old equipment to complete factory design and setup
Consider your monthly solvent bill. Much of that is spent at your manual parts washing station. The washing sink on your factory floor is wasteful, slow, and labor intensive. As the primary generator of waste solvent at your plant, it’s costing your company money three ways: You pay for fresh solvent, you pay to have dirty solvent hauled away, and you pay for solvent that evaporates from the open sink washing stations.
Parts washing is a full time job, with at least one parts washer supporting every shift. The work itself is time consuming and unpleasant. The parts washer person must wear heavy gloves and a respirator, and it’s physically demanding. Turnover is high in this position, but inexperienced workers can hold up production while skilled machine operators wait for parts for the next print run.
There are ancillary costs as well. Because solvent is lost from the sinks into the plant, air must be turned over more often, increasing expenditures associated with heating and cooling makeup air.
In the most simple terms, the Sunnyday APWS is a huge airtight dishwasher. The APWS sprays hot solvents at high pressure across the equipment inside, removing ink and adhesives. After everything is clean, the solvent is evaporated off the parts so they are dry and ready to use.
Unlike manual parts washing, running the APWS is only a part time job. The worker loads the parts onto the APWS cart, rolls the cart into the washer, hits the start button, and goes back to work.
The most important part of the APWS system is the solvent recovery system. This automated distillery cleans the used solvent and recycles it to the APWS clean solvent reservoir. Instead of generating thousands of gallons of waste solvent, the APWS produces a very small amount of very concentrated waste that goes to the recycler. The whole system is airtight, so nobody has to wear a respirator, you don’t have to spend money conditioning make up air, and it’s environmentally friendly.
The cost of an APWS varies according to the size of the shop, but labor and solvent savings repay the capital investment in under a year. After that, the ongoing savings translate directly to your bottom line.