An apparatus for shaping plastics material pre-forms into plastics material containers has a conveying device which conveys the plastics material pre-forms along a pre-set conveying path. The conveying device has a movable station carrier arranged at least indirectly on a stationary base carrier and on which a plurality of shaping stations are arranged. The shaping stations have blow molding devices which form cavities inside which the plastics material preforms are shaped to form plastics material containers. The blow molding devices are arranged on blow mold carriers. The apparatus has a changing device suitable for removing at least the blow molding devices from the blow mold carriers and/or arranging blow molding devices on the blow mold carriers. A changing device has a gripping device for gripping the blow molding device, wherein this gripping device is movable in at least two different directions and is pivotable about at least three different axes.

A control system (34) for a unit (9) for forming containers (2) from blanks (3) provided with a series of forming stations (10) each provided with a mold (11), the system (34) including a master control unit (36) and a series of slave controllers (37) each associated with at least one forming station (10), each controller (37) being programmed to: control the or each associated forming station (10) according to a forming command (CF) loaded in the controller (37); take into account a pressure measurement in the mold (11), from this measurement, establish a blowing curve describing the change in the fluid pressure in the mold (11), analyze the blowing curve and extract therefrom the coordinates of at least one singular point (S); communicate the singular point (S) to the control unit (36).

A container treatment plant and a method for the treatment of containers are described. The container treatment plant includes a plurality of treatment elements, wherein each treatment element is used for a pre-determined treatment of the containers and each treatment element has associated therewith a container nominal value which indicates which type of container the treatment element can treat, a detection device for detecting properties of one of the containers to be treated, and a comparator device for comparing a detection result of the detection device with the container nominal value for at least one treatment element.

In a method for monitoring a blow-moulding device for producing a hollow body, the blow-moulding device includes at least one process valve unit for feeding a process fluid into a preform of the hollow body under process pressure, wherein the process valve unit includes at least one electrically operated valve. During a blow-moulding process, at least one value of an electric current of the electrically operated valve is detected. The method and the device allow early recognition of an ageing process of the process valves, in particular their pilot valves, and/or the recognition of the status of valve properties.