Getting Your Krones Contiform 1/2 Back Up to Speed
If you’re running an older Krones Contiform 1/2, you’ve probably noticed things slowing down. Your cycle times aren’t what they used to be, and it’s frustrating. Most of the time, you don’t need a whole new oven to fix it. You just need better heat. Swapping out those old, tired lamps for high-density infrared ones usually does the trick. The problem with “cold spots” Here’s the thing: these machines rely on shortwave infrared to get the PET preforms hot fast. But as lamps age, their wattage drops. When one lamp isn’t pulling its weight, you get “cold spots.” That’s where the trouble starts. You end up with uneven walls and, eventually, bottles that just burst. We keep our replacement lamps on a tight leash with the wattage so the heat stays uniform across the whole zone. No surprises, just a consistent blow. Built for the grind We use heavy-wall quartz glass because, let’s face it, these things get incredibly hot. Cheaper glass bows under the pressure. Ours doesn’t. We also stick to the standard R7s or Sk15 connectors. Why? Because nobody wants to spend their weekend modifying sockets. You just plug them in and go. Plus, we use a halogen gas fill inside the tube. It stops the filament from evaporating too quickly, which is a lifesaver when you’re running 24/7. A quick word of caution Now, you might be tempted to go for the highest wattage possible to crank up your bottles-per-hour. It works, but there’s a catch. More power means more heat soaking into the machine frame. If you go big on the lamps,**check your cooling blowers.**If they’re clogged with dust or just plain worn out, that extra heat has nowhere to go. It’ll soak into the oven walls and can actually warp your preform mandrels. Not a fun fix. At the end of the day, replacing the lamps is a simple, drop-in fix. It just brings the machine back to the way it felt the day it was installed.