Califia Farms, maker of plant milks, creamers, barista products, brewed-to-blend coffees and heavy whipping cream, installed a V31 vision inspection system from Mettler-Toledo on its main packaging line last year to ensure every bottle leaving the facility meets its standards.

“We had two main goals for our new vision system,” says Keith Meadows, director of engineering, Califa Farms. “The first was to verify proper cap placement on every bottle to maintain package integrity, and the second was to monitor our upstream filling and closing equipment to optimize production efficiency. We considered multiple vendors, looking at equipment quality and reliability. The V31 came highly recommended by our sales rep and solutions engineer, Angelica Amancio of Pacific Packaging and Inspection, and Mettler-Toledo's great customer service sealed the deal.”

Mettler-Toledo's modular V31 vision system can inspect caps, lids and/or labels at speeds up to 1,000 packages per minute. Califia’s system is equipped with three cameras for identification and removal of high caps, damaged caps, broken shrink bands and other closure issues. The system handles bottles ranging from 10.5 to 72 oz. in size, which are sealed with either a combination foil seal and closure or with a cap with a tamper-evident band.

“One of the biggest advantages of the V31 is its flexibility,” says Martha Cervantes, QA continuous improvement specialist at Califia Farms. “We often changeover this line several times a day to accommodate our many beverage types and bottle sizes, and our vision system transitions seamlessly. A simple recipe selection and height adjustment is all that’s needed, and we're ready to run in under five minutes.”

Califia’s V31 includes customized features for its unique production requirements, including traceability capabilities to identify which station on the upstream capper is having an issue if the vision system sees an uptick in cap defects. It’s also equipped with a specially-designed air nozzle that removes condensation before inspection for optimal accuracy. 

“Space efficiency was another big consideration for us, and the V31's compact frame was easily installed right over our existing conveyor system,” says Patrick Fischer, senior engineering maintenance manager at Califia Farms.

As a company handling nuts and other allergens, sanitation at Califia is paramount as well. 

“The V31's integration with our clean-in-place system significantly simplifies our cleaning protocols,” Fischer says. “It runs through an automated cleaning cycle, gets just a quick wipe-down by an operator and we're done.”