OMRON introduces Color Mark Sensor on IoT platform enabling higher productivity in packaging processes

July 30, 2016

Omron Automation, a leading solutions provider for the packaging industry, has introduced a new range of color mark sensors to enable the food and beverage makers with the right technology for stable detection of color marks on food packages.

The sensors – Photoelectric Sensor E3S-DC Series (E3S-DC) and Color Fiber Amplifier Unit E3NX-CA Series (E3NX-CA) can detect color marks which are printed on glossy or colorful materials and may have only subtle differences in colors – which are currently very difficult to detect. This leads to a considerable reduction in the time necessary to start production and maintenance contributing to an overall enhancement in productivity in the entire packaging process.

“Inspired with our quest to proactively identify the challenges and needs of the target industry, we worked closely with the customers to come up with these sensors equipped with OMRON’s proprietary sensing technology and algorithm to stably detect ‘differences in colors’ under varied demanding conditions. The sensors also help in optimizing initially set parameters to adjust to minor changes in the color of the packaging materials. This solves the current issue of repetitive teaching of the sensors even for small color variations in the packaging material leading to improvement in the uptime of the packaging units by about 10 – 15%” said Mr. Sameer Gandhi, MD, Omron Automation, India. “These sensors are IoT enabled to help our customers take full advantage of the benefits of a digital factory”, he added.

 Key benefits

• Reliably detecting color marks on various packaging materials
• These sensors have nine banks to memorize up to nine different color marks eliminating the need of teaching the sensor for every lot change thus improving productivity.
• High Dynamic Range for stable detection even with 99% reflective surface
• like highly glossy aluminum packaging material.
• RGB data transmission function for visualization of color variation for similar looking marks to avoid line stoppage and downtime required for teaching the sensor.
• These sensors are IoT enabled and the process parameters of the sensors can be monitored to help in predictive maintenance thus increasing the uptime of the packaging process.