A stack of products such as pouches are formed in a product bucket, pushed into a stack guide bucket and from there into a carton. A stack tamp descends over the stack, engages and confines it downwardly during stack pushing from product bucket and through stack guide bucket into a carton. Multiple product buckets, stack guide buckets and cartons move downstream during cartoning, and are respectively aligned in a cartoning station. Reciprocal containment blades hold the stack in respective cartons prior to flap closing.

A method is described and illustrated for filling packages open on one side, in particular cardboard composite packages, with flowable products, in particular foodstuffs, in a filling machine. So that the packages can be impinged sufficiently and reliably with hot air, drying air and/or sterilising agent simply, quickly and with a small space requirement, it is provided that hot air, drying air and/or sterilising agent is introduced into the packages 2 open on one side from above via at least one nozzle as they are transported past under the nozzle and in that the hot air, the drying air and/or the sterilising agent are directed towards the packages from at least one elongated nozzle slot extending transverse to the transport direction.

A filling device, in particular for filling liquid containers of electronic cigarettes with a liquid, includes: a rotary carrousel configured to rotate about a main axis of rotation, a pump cam track extending about the main axis, where the rotary carrousel includes multiple hose pumps arranged in an annular configuration about the main axis, where each hose pump includes: a hose, a rotary pump device, the rotary pump device including: a roller rotor including a number of rollers which are configured to engage the hose and urge the liquid through the hose, a cam rotor including a number of pump cams which are configured to engage the pump cam track, the cam rotor being coupled to the roller rotor.

Process to produce containers out of preforms, in which the preform is inserted in a form-filling station, molded and filled in this station. Gas, which remains in the head space after the end of the filling process, is replaced by a purge gas, and a form-filling machine is provided to produce and to fill containers made of preforms.

A stack of products such as pouches are formed in a product bucket, pushed into a stack guide bucket and from there into a carton. A stack tamp descends over the stack, engages and confines it downwardly during stack pushing from product bucket and through stack guide bucket into a carton. Multiple product buckets, stack guide buckets and cartons move downstream during cartoning, and are respectively aligned in a cartoning station. Reciprocal containment blades hold the stack in respective cartons prior to flap closing.

A method and apparatus for forming, by means of expansion, plastic preforms into plastic containers in a hollow mold and for filling a substantially liquid product or at least a liquid or solid component of the product into the plastic containers in the hollow mold. The product is filled into the plastic containers while the respective plastic container has inserted therein, at least partially, a stretching rod or a filler neck, and the insertion depth of the stretching rod or of the filler neck is, at the end of the filling process, adjusted such that the volume displaced in the product by the stretching rod or the filler neck corresponds to a predetermined desired ullage.

A conveyance mechanism is provided. A bag body processing unit is installed with a roller unit. While the process transfer unit transfers a bag body processing unit from a first guide station to a second guide station, the roller unit moves from a first guide surface to a second guide surface and is placed on the second guide surface in the second guide station. In the second guide station, the roller unit is placed on the second guide surface, and a second guide part is moved from a first variation position to a second variation position while the roller unit is placed on the second guide surface, so that the roller unit is moved from a first height position to a second height position.

A filling station for filling containers includes a number of container holders defining respective container positions; a number of filling assemblies, each filling assembly being associated with a container holder, where each filling assembly includes a reciprocating nozzle assembly which makes a first reciprocating movement from a retracted nozzle position in which a nozzle is retracted from the container to an inserted nozzle position in which the nozzle is inserted into the container, where the nozzle moves through an opening in a lid member of a reciprocating lid assembly to be inserted into the container for filling the container with liquid; where the reciprocating lid assembly makes a second reciprocating movement towards a filling opening of the container in the container holder and back in a direction away from the filling opening, where the reciprocating lid assembly is under pretension in the direction of the container holder.

Embodiments of the invention include apparatus for filling containers and related methods. In an embodiment, an apparatus includes a rotary turret assembly rotatably coupled to a filler frame. The rotary turret assembly can include a rotary base and a plurality of hollow columns mounted on the rotary base and arranged in a circle. A plurality of piston assemblies can be configured to move up and down within the hollow columns. Each piston assembly can include a piston body and a top hat assembly configured to releasably engage the top of the piston body. The piston body and the top hat assembly can release from one another when a release lever is engaged. Rotation of the rotary column group causes the cam contact members of the piston assemblies to move over a surface of a cam track causing vertical movement of the top hat assemblies. Other embodiments are included herein.

A stack of products such as pouches are formed in a product bucket, pushed into a stack guide bucket and from there into a carton. A stack tamp descends over the stack, engages and confines it downwardly during stack pushing from product bucket and through stack guide bucket into a carton. Multiple product buckets, stack guide buckets and cartons move downstream during cartoning, and are respectively aligned in a cartoning station. Reciprocal containment blades hold the stack in respective cartons prior to flap closing.