WALLA WALLA, Wash.—Symetix will demonstrate its newest inspection system, the VeriSym SE, at its SupplySide West booth. The new “counting" and “cruise control" features of the VeriSym SE and Symetix Secure Connection, which offer remote assistance and diagnosis by qualified Symetix technicians, will also be shown.
The VeriSym SE is an affordable high-performance optical inspection system designed to verify softgels continuously, in-line after a single encapsulator, on a continuous drying line, or off-line in a batch mode during product manufacturing or packaging. With the optional counting feature, manufacturers are able to pack directly into boxes, bags or bins without the need for expensive and bulky weigh count systems.
As the smallest member of the VeriSym family, VeriSym SE inspects up to 300,000 softgels per hour within its compact footprint. In addition to its ability to detect subtle product color variations, symmetry, size and shape defects, it removes foreign softgels and defects such as air bubbles in fill material from the product stream to assure product quality while reducing labor costs and overall footprint.
Pharmaceutical and nutraceutical product manufacturers can batch-feed the bulk-to-bulk VeriSym SE from trays, totes, or bins, or they can integrate the VeriSymSE with a continuous drying line. It is also ideal for contract packers looking to automate product verification during packaging.
Unlike manual inspection, VeriSym SE is objective and consistent, which improves final product quality. Automating inspection with VeriSym SE increases product yield by minimizing the removal of acceptable product, which is common with manual inspection. The system reduces the risk of contamination by minimizing human contact with product. Based on labor savings alone, VeriSym SE offers a payback of less than 12 months. Improvements in production efficiency further speed payback.
Softgels are fed into VeriSym SE’s infeed hopper, either automatically from a continuous dry line or manually from trays, totes or bins. The hopper meters product onto the infeed shaker that spreads the product evenly for viewing by a top-mounted color camera that inspects each object’s color, size and shape. Proprietary image processing technology quickly analyzes the images, comparing each object to previously defined accept/reject standards to detect foreign softgels and defects such as spots, color variations, air bubbles in fill material and misshapen softgels. When a defective product or unconfirmed object is identified, the system activates the close-coupled high-speed air ejector system to remove it from the product stream that leads to packaging.
The modular VeriSym SE is compact and portable, with a footprint of only 9 feet (2.7 m) long and 3 feet (0.9 m) wide, which includes the infeed hopper and reject manifold. VeriSym SE features the same graphical user interface (GUI) as other VeriSym systems, which eases training for customers with the higher capacity VeriSym or VeriSym SL systems already installed in their plant. The GUI can be accessed remotely via the network or Internet.
Designed for fast and easy product changeovers, VeriSym SE can be cleared, cleaned and set-up to handle the next product in less than 10 minutes, with no tools required. Product settings, including accept/reject standards, can be stored in the system’s memory for quick and easy recall. The system can inspect oval, round and oblong softgels ranging in size from two to 40.
Symetix designed VeriSym SE for nutraceuticals and regulated pharmaceuticals. The VeriSym SE is FDA 21 CFR part 11 compliant with secure and encrypted logs, secure passcode management, parameter histograms and guided changeover. VeriSym SE is designed to meet FDA requirements and comply with GAMP guidelines.
In addition to softgels, VeriSym SE is perfectly suitable for inspecting coated tablets, detecting and removing foreign tablets, broken tablets, stained tablets, and tablets with missing coating if the coating is a different color than the underlying tablet’s core.