Oral Presentation Hydroponic Farmers Federation Conference 2018

What Thermotrac and Dynexus Lets Us… Do (#14)

Piotr Bankowski 1
  1. Visy, Campbellfield, VIC, Australia

Thermotrac and Dynexus are two of Visy’s newest technologies which work together to deliver a packaging solution based on science rather than guess work.  Thermotrac gives us the ability to quickly design a box for fast and uniform cooling for a particular supply chain.  It considers the temperatures and airflows of the entire supply chain from harvest to cool room, through transport and back of store and even consumers, if required.  The half cooling time approach reduces the large number of variables associated with trials to one important number which is a direct reflection on the cooling performance of the box.

The cooling performance is closely linked with box strength as the two must be balanced to achieve satisfactory performance in the supply chain.  Dynexus is a computer simulation tool which can predict the top load strength, base sag and other performance characteristics of a box.  It was developed because there was no reliable mathematical means of predicting the strength of complex box and trays designs, such as produce trays, shelf ready packaging, Visobins or two piece boxes.  Until now, only the strength of RSCs could be predicted through the McKee equation.

The two technologies work together, or independently, and allow Visy to quickly and confidently develop and improve packaging in the cold supply chain.  They reduce the risk and costs of unsuccessful trials and increase speed to market as less trials are required during the development process.  The technologies are used to screen proposed designs, eliminate poor performing alternatives and present the best candidates to customers.  Packing and transport trials are then conducted on the best candidates with a higher level of success.