Daniel Müller is Sales Director in the Cap­sule Tech­nolo­gies divi­sion at Harro Höfliger. In an inter­view he talks about the devel­op­ment of the new cap­sule filling machine and explains its unique features.

Daniel, the new Modu‑C cap­sule filling machine has the name CS. Why?

So far, the cap­sule sector has been con­sisting of three basic machines. The LS (Low Speed), which is mainly suited for devel­op­ment pur­poses with 25,000 cap­sules per hour. Then there are two machine types used for pro­duc­tion: The MS which stands for Mid Speed with an output of 100,000 cap­sules per hour, and the HS – High Speed – with an output of 200,000 cap­sules. With 43,500 cap­sules per hour, the new machine ranks right between our LS and MS models. This is where CS comes from: Cross Speed.

“100 % weighing of cap­sules in a closed con­tain­ment is a real rev­o­lu­tion.”Daniel Müller, Sales Director Cap­sule Tech­nolo­gies at Harro Höfliger

Who was the target audi­ence for the devel­op­ment of this machine?

Gen­er­ally speaking, every com­pany in the cap­sule sector that finds itself in this output seg­ment. All common pow­ders and pel­lets can be filled on it; and the machine can be used for both R&D and com­mer­cial production.

Due to working very effi­ciently with small residual powder quan­ti­ties, it is also ide­ally suited for high-priced drugs. In addi­tion, phar­ma­ceu­tical devel­op­ment depart­ments are dealing with increas­ingly com­plex pow­ders, such as freeze-dried pow­ders or pure active ingre­di­ents, which are usu­ally very cohe­sive. Even such demanding pow­ders can be safely dosed with the CS model.

A unique fea­ture is that we can install two drum sta­tions on one dosing trolley at the same time. This enables the filling of two sep­a­rate powder types into one cap­sule. Fur­ther­more, the drum filler tech­nology is used for the dosing of tiny quan­ti­ties or of mate­rial with very low density.

Not least, we are also addressing con­tract man­u­fac­turers with the CS because, among other things, it offers the Modu‑C series’ famous flexibility.

What does flex­i­bility mean here?

The­o­ret­i­cally, it means that hun­dreds of dif­ferent prod­ucts can be pro­duced on one single machine. This is due to our trolley con­cept: The dosing sys­tems are located on a mobile trolley which can be rapidly and easily moved out of the machine and replaced by another one. In addi­tion, our exchange­able format parts cover the entire dosing range. By the way, one and the same trolley can be used in the non-con­tain­ment and in the con­tain­ment version.

Why is there a con­tain­ment version?

Many ingre­di­ents which are filled into cap­sules nowa­days are highly active. This is why we gen­erate neg­a­tive pres­sure in the machine so that the par­ti­cles cannot escape. The active ingre­dient shall reach the patient but not the operator.

We can inte­grate a deduster to clean the shell of every cap­sule. An external deduster is no longer nec­es­sary, which reduces space require­ments. In addi­tion, we have devel­oped a spe­cial cleaning system with spray mist for addi­tional oper­ator safety. More­over, the fact that 100 % weighing can also be imple­mented in the closed con­tain­ment, is a real rev­o­lu­tion in the cap­sule sector.

What makes this weighing method so spe­cial in your eyes?

We check the weight of every indi­vidual filled cap­sule gravi­met­ri­cally – and this is done com­pletely inside the system, which is some­thing that does not exist in any other con­tain­ment cap­sule filling machine. Weigh cells are very sen­si­tive and weight deter­mi­na­tion can be dis­turbed by air flows and vibra­tions. In order to pre­vent this, our engi­neers have devel­oped a spe­cial tech­nical solution.

In addi­tion to 100 % weighing, we can inte­grate an IPC sta­tion, which stands for in-process con­trol. The system then checks the net weight, i.e. only the filling mate­rial of, for example, 20 cap­sules every half hour. We also use that sta­tion to adjust and cal­i­brate the AMV sensor for the capac­i­tive inline con­trol of the filling quantity.

Hence the motto “Every cap­sule counts”?

Cap­sule weighing and many other addi­tional fea­tures make it pos­sible to ensure high cap­sule quality. Whether we are talking about a patient who needs a med­ica­tion for treating a dis­ease, or a phar­ma­ceu­tical com­pany who fills high-priced pow­ders – both depend on flaw­less pro­cessing and in both cases this means: “Every cap­sule counts”. There­fore, this motto was at the heart of devel­oping the CS.

Down­load this article as PDF file

Photos: Janine Kyofsky, Helmar Lünig