SCHOTT on the way to ‘zero defect’ glass tubing

SCHOTT is integrating a specially developed big data solution into its pharmaceutical tubing production, replacing statistical sample-based quality assurance with 100 percent on-line measurement. With the new IT-based process called perfeXion™, process- and product-quality data of each individual glass tube is collected online and in real-time – an innovation that sets new standards in the industry. Instead of selecting a few glass tubes from each batch for statistical quality control, the new perfeXion™ system measures the entire glass tube many times over as it is drawn from the melt. Lasers recognize deviations in diameter and wall thickness, for example, and camera and IR inspection systems can even detect the smallest inclusions in the glass. Around 100,000 data tags are generated every minute. An integrated IT system, evaluating the continuous glass tube with real-time data measurements, calculates incidents of imperfection with such precision that it can later differentiate corresponding individual tubes which can then be sorted out. Each tube is checked again at its completion. SCHOTT already implemented perfeXion™ at all FIOLAX^® tubing lines in its German plants. It is currently being installed at sites in Brazil and India.

Company name: SCHOTT AG, Germany
Website: http://www.schott.com/
E-mail: chtistina.rettig@schott.com
Name of product: perfeXion