PET Technologies streamlines bottle manufacturing for a major beverage producer
FOR over 26 years, manufacturers in the beverage industry have been working with PET Technologies to implement customised solutions for PET bottle blowing. Each project is tailored to the customer’s individual production needs: from bottle design and mould manufacturing to equipment production and technical support.
The cooperation between Mykulynetsky Brovar and PET Technologies is testimony to this. As part of a new project, the beer and beverage manufacturer required a customised solution which included designing a PET bottle, manufacturing a high-performance APF-Max 8 blow moulding machine, and designing and manufacturing moulds.
One of Ukraine’s oldest breweries, Mykulynetsky Brovar, traces its origins to 1457. “Mykulynetsky Brovar” LLC combines centuries-old tradition with modern production technologies. The company continues to develop, modernise its equipment, expand its product range, and enter new markets.
The customer approached PET Technologies in 2014, marking the beginning of an 11-year partnership. At that time, the company installed a third-generation APF-6004 automatic machine with a capacity of 6,000 bottles per hour. The equipment has been operating steadily for more than a decade, receiving technical support and moulds for new formats.
Mykulynetsky Brovar produces a wide range of beers, soft drinks, and mineral water, covering multiple beverage segments and market demands. Such diversity creates both broad opportunities and significant production challenges for PET bottles. Each flavour requires a separate bottle, neck, preform colour, and separate sets of moulds.
Frequent format changes, replacement of blow moulds, and line reconfiguration take up valuable time and reduce overall productivity. During peak periods, when the product range is running at full capacity, any delay significantly affects the speed of product delivery to the market. Mykulynetsky Brovar needed a solution from PET Technologies to optimise time-consuming processes and to create a unified bottle design that would work for beer, colourful drinks, and crystal-clear water. After a detailed analysis of production needs, a solution that reduced the number of formats and setup time while maintaining the product recognisability was proposed. The product range remains diverse and vibrant as ever, but production is more efficient.
Optimisation and unification: a solution that delivers real results
An innovative solution was created: a unified design for 1-litre and 1.5-litre bottles that work equally well for beer, soft drinks, and bottled water.
Depending on the product, bottles are blown from preforms in three colours: brown, blue, and clear. Due to the NIR heating system on the APF-Max 8, the preforms are heated deeply and evenly, ensuring stable material distribution throughout the bottle geometry. One set of blow moulds is suitable for preforms weighing from 29.5 g to 30.5 g, which gives the manufacturer high flexibility and uniformity across the entire range. This solution has made it possible to standardise production, reduce the cost of additional mould sets, and minimise downtime during mould changes.
All this is implemented on the APFMax 8 blow moulding machine. The line’s productivity is 12,000 bottles per hour, which has effectively doubled the performance compared to the APF-6004 model. Using only two sets of blow moulds, the manufacturer already saves a significant amount of time thanks to their quick replacement. In the APFMax series machines, this operation is simplified by a special trolley for quick removal and installation of mould sets, as well as a convenient cabinet in which the moulds are stored directly next to the working area.
