Used Packaging Equipment

Used Packaging Equipment

Used packaging equipment can be utilized in a wide range of industries, including pharmaceutical, for the proportionally-correct dispensing of life-saving medication; retail, for storage and aesthetically-pleasing displays for products ranging from can openers to miniature race cars; medical, for sanitary packaging of surgical equipment and other medical components; industrial manufacturing, for the safe packaging of hazardous chemicals for storage purposes until required for use; and food and beverage, for the sanitary packaging of items such as bread, cookies, pasta and more for consumption. Although used packaging equipment can be advantageous in that it is a much more cost-efficient alternative to buying new packaging machinery, there are some disadvantages. The main disadvantage of buying a used packaging machine is that it will not be custom-fitted to its application. Since the majority of new packaging equipment is custom-fitted to the consumer's application or to fit in a pre-existing packaging system, the used packaging equipment will not work quite as well, having been previously outfitted for another company.

The main types of used packaging equipment include used filling machines, used sealing machines, used vacuum packaging machines and used strapping machines. Used filling machines are used to take packaging and fill that packaging with a certain number of parts, either one or two large parts or even a hundred smaller parts, or to a certain level, such as halfway full with a liquid. Used sealing machines, such as used heat sealers, are used packaging equipment that package products by placing them between two layers of thermoplastic film and then bonding the edges together. The bonding process occurs as the result of the application of high heat. Used vacuum packing machines are the most common type of previously-owned packaging equipment. This type of used packaging machine provides air-tight packaging through removal of the atmospheric oxygen prior to sealing of the package. Used external sealers and used chamber sealers are the two main types of used vacuum packing machines. Used chamber sealers are more commonly utilized in bulk material handling applications than used external sealers, thus being more popular in the industrial manufacturing industry. Used strapping machines are a little outside of traditional used packaging equipment, and instead of wholly enclosing a product, it simply fastens that product down using a strap, which is a long narrow strip of flexible material (often a durable plastic).