GLASS BOTTLE PRODUCTION Product Description and Intended use Glass bottles are virtually chemically inert and

impervious to the materials they are designed to contain, protect and preserve during the anticipated life cycle. Glass is biologically an inactive material. Generally, glass does not support development of bacteria or microorganisms. Glass bottles are composed from melted sand, soda-ash and limestone, otherwise referred to as soda- lime-silicate glass. These bottles are produced by blowing and/or pressing in a mould through various manufacturing processes. They can be manufactured in a variety of colours and can be supplied with etched, decorated or applied labels. Glass bottles can be unitized in boxes/cartons, layers (and may have some form of separation) and palletized. Glass bottle storage requirements are defined by cleanliness and customer requirements. Intended use should be consistent with reasonable and foreseeable end use applications. Process description for each step: 1) Receipt of raw & packaging materials a. Consignments of raw & packaging materials are received by the store keeper who in turn notifies QA b. Each consignment is checked on receipt by QA, with a special visual inspection performed. QA also checks the production date as well as the expiry date of packaging materials. If all is intact, samples are taken for analysis in the laboratory c. Once analysis conducted conforms with the COA (Certificate of Analysis)/Internal specification/NIS standard for the raw material in particular, the raw material is released to the warehouse 2) Storage of raw & packaging materials Raw materials & packaging materials are stored in a dry storage condition. 3) Material Treatment i) Sand Treatment a) Unwashed sand is filled into sand hopper and flushed/washed with jets of water b) Flushed sand is then dried and sieved to remove extraneous materials such as plant debris ii) Cullet Treatment a) Unwashed foreign cullet is loaded into cullet hopper and flushed/washed with jets of water

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b) Washed cullets are then conveyed over magnetic belt conveyor which traps magnetic impurities. c) Line inspectors perform visual inspection to remove extraneous and non-magnetic materials such as straws and plant roots from cullets on the magnetic belt conveyor. d) Cullets are then crushed into smaller shards

4) Batch mixing a) Raw materials (sand, limestone, soda ash & cullet) are weighed and loaded into appropriate silos for transfer to the batch house b) Batch house measures, assembles, mixes, and delivers the glass raw material recipe (batch) via an array of chutes, conveyors, and scales to the furnace. c) The conveyors are lined with magnet to remove magnetic impurities before batch delivery to furnace d) Glass raw material recipe (batch) that do not meet specification are rejected by QA and sent for rework 5) Batch melting a) The batch enters the furnace at the doghouse or batch charger. Different glass types, colors, desired quality, raw material purity / availability, and furnace design affect the batch recipe. b) The batch is fed into the furnace at a slow, controlled rate by the batch processing system (batch house) c) Batch is melted in the furnace at temperatures up to 1,575C. 6) Product formation i) Blow and blow process

a) A stream of molten glass, at its plastic temperature (1050C-1200C), is cut with a shearing blade to form a cylinder of glass, called a gob. b) Glass bottle formation starts with the gob falling, by gravity, and guided, through troughs and chutes, into the blank moulds, two halves which are clamped shut and then sealed by a baffle from above. c) The glass is blown through a valve in the baffle, forcing it down into the three piece "ring mould", which is held in the "neckring arm" below the blanks, to form the "finish", or top of the parison. The "rings" are sealed from below by a short plunger. d) After the "settleblow" finishes, the plunger retracts slightly, to allow the skin that's formed to soften, before counterblow" air blows up through the plunger, to create a parison, or pre-container.

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e) The baffle raises, the blanks open, and the parison is inverted in an arc to the "mould side" by the "neckring arm", which holds the "parison" by the "finish". f) As the "neckring arm" reaches the end of its arc, two mould halves close around the "parison", the "neckring arm" opens slightly to release the "finish" then reverts to the blank side. g) Final blow applied through the "blowhead" blows the glass out, into the mould, to make the final container shape. ii) Press and blow process

a) In the case of press and blow process, the parison is formed with a long metal plunger, which rises up and presses the glass out, to fill the ring and blank moulds. b) The process then continues as before, with the parison being transferred to the mould, and the glass being blown out into the mould. c) The container is then picked up from the mould by the "take-out" mechanism, and held over the "deadplate", where air cooling helps cool down the still soft glass, until finally, the bottles are swept onto a conveyor by the "push out paddles" that have air pockets to keep the bottles standing after landing on the "deadplate", now ready for annealing. 7) Internal treatment a) After the forming process, some containersparticularly those intended for alcoholic spiritsundergo a treatment to improve the chemical resistance of the inside, called internal treatment or deakalization. b) This is usually accomplished through the injection of a sulfur- or fluorine-containing gas mixture into bottles at high temperatures. c) The gas is typically delivered to the container either in the air used in the forming process (that is, during the final blow of the container), or through a nozzle directing a stream of the gas into the mouth of the bottle after forming. d) The treatment renders the container more resistant to alkali extraction, which can cause increases in product pH, and in some cases container degradation. 8) Hot end coating At the hot end, a very thin layer of tin oxide is applied either using a safe organic compound or inorganic stannic chloride. Tin based systems are not the only ones used, although the most popular. Titanium tetrachloride or organotitanates can also be used. In all cases the coating renders the surface of the glass more adhesive to the cold end coating.

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9) Product annealing An annealing oven (known in the industry as a Lehr) heats the glass bottle to about 580C then cools it, depending on the glass bottle thickness, over a 20 6000 minute period. 10) Cold end coating a) At the cold end, a layer of typically, polyethylene wax, is applied via a water based emulsion. This makes the glass slippery, protecting it from scratching and stopping glass bottles from sticking together when they are moved on a conveyor. b) The resultant invisible combined coating gives a virtually unscratchable surface to the glass. 11) Product Inspection a) Glass bottles are 100% inspected; automatic machines, or sometimes persons, inspect every glass bottle for a variety of faults such as spikes, birdswings, checks, blisters, tears, stones, chipped finish, chokes, crizzles among others. b) In addition to rejecting faulty containers, inspection equipment gathers statistical information and relays it to the forming machine operators in the hot end. c) Computer systems collect fault information and trace it to the mould that produced the container. This is done by reading the mould number on the glass bottle, which is encoded (as a numeral or a binary code of dots), on the glass bottle by the mould that made it. d) Operators carry out a range of checks manually on samples of glass bottles, usually visual and dimensional checks in order to ensure that product appearance matches the specified requirements. All products (lot) matching the specifications are approved for packing. e) All rejected glass bottles are culletized and sent for rework

12) Product printing/decoration (Secondary processing) a) Sometimes glass bottle factories offer services such as labelling. Several labelling technologies are available. Unique to glass is the Applied Ceramic Labelling process (ACL). b) This is screen-printing of the decoration onto the glass bottle with vitreous enamel paint, which is then baked on. c) Operators carry out visual checks on every printed glass bottles

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d) Printed glass bottles that fail to meet specifications are sent for rework

13) Product packing Glass bottles are packaged in various ways. Palletising on standard-sized pallets with between 1000 and 4000 glass bottles each are carried out by automatic machines (palletisers) which arrange and stack glass bottles separated by layer sheets. Other possibilities include boxes and even hand sewn sacks. Once packed, the new "stock units" are labelled. 14) Product strapping & Shrink wrapping The full pallets are strapped & wrapped in special film to prevent damage and protect the integrity of the products (glass bottles) during storage and transport 15) Product warehousing/storage The finished products (glass bottles) are kept in the companys own warehouse until they are delivered to customers

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