CHICAGO — Graham Engineering Corp. introduced the new GEC Four Station Indexing Wheel, and displayed, for the first time ever, a Graham wheel machine at NPE 1997 in Chicago.
The firm also ran a 10-pound-shot-capacity accumulator head machine, demonstrating its color-change capabilities.
The indexing wheel is used for the medium- to high-volume production of bottles as large as 5 liters, such as personal care, motor oil, household chemical and food and beverage containers. The wheel can be equipped with a single head and four-cavity production and, depending on bottle size, multiple heads for as many as four parisons and 16 cavities.
The family of Graham indexing wheels contains a five-station model designed for containers from 1-gallon to 5-gallon capacity.
The firm's indexing wheels target customers that would consider buying multicavity shuttles, long-stroke machines or reciprocating screw machinery. At Graham's NPE booth, the GEC Four Station Indexing Wheel produced 12-ounce shower gel bottles, running in 16 cavities, with calibrated neck finish and in-machine trimming and deflashing.
Also on exhibit was the GEC 10, producing parts of a toy castle for Hedstrom Corp. Hedstrom is one of Graham's accumulator head machinery customers. The machine is certified for the European market and was bought by a customer in Europe.
