Getting More Out of Your Old Krones Contiform S
Let’s be honest: running an older Krones Contiform S line can be frustrating. You want to hit modern cycle times, but the machine just isn’t keeping up. Before you start looking at the price tag of a brand-new machine, take a look at your heating oven. Most of the time, that’s where the bottleneck is hiding. If your IR bulbs are worn out, you aren’t getting the heat you need to stretch those preforms quickly. Replacing those old bulbs with something precision-built can bring the whole line back to life.
The secret is in the heat density
Here is how it works. The Contiform S uses short-wave infrared radiation to heat the PET without melting the neck. We build our replacement bulbs to match the original OEM wattage and voltage exactly, but we use a higher-grade tungsten filament and better quartz glass. The result? A more concentrated blast of heat. Instead of waiting around, your preforms hit the right blowing temperature in a few seconds less. It sounds small, but when you’re running thousands of bottles, those seconds add up to a lot of extra product.
The nitty-gritty on hardware
We don’t cut corners on the materials. We use heavy-wall quartz tubing because thin glass bows when it gets hot, and that ruins your heat distribution. Then there are the connectors—usually those R7s slide-in sockets. We make sure the fit is tight. If you have a loose connection, you get arcing. And if you get arcing, you’ll be replacing your sockets in a few weeks. Nobody wants to do that. But the real magic is in the coating. We apply a specific layer to the glass that shifts the IR spectrum. This helps the heat actually penetrate the PET wall rather than just bouncing off. You get a nice, even heat from the outside in, without those annoying “hot spots” that ruin a bottle.
A quick word of caution
Now, you can’t just crank up the heat and forget about it. If you push more wattage through the oven to hit those higher speeds, your cooling fans have to work harder. If your vents are clogged or your airflow is weak, you risk overheating the whole housing. Check your fans first. Once you know the air is moving, you can ramp up the power without worrying about thermal shock burning out your new bulbs.