QSPY-16A Automatic Packing Machine Price and Payback

The QSPY-16A automatic packing machine price is one line on a quotation, but the machine behind that line is assembled from six parts that behave very differently once the line runs. The strap head and the arch do the work. The frame sets the arch over the conveyor. The cabinet sequences the cycle. The strap is a consumable. The air supply may not exist in your hall at all. Installation is measured in hours on a conveyor that already runs, not in weeks of civil work.

Most buyers compare these units on arch size and price, then find the real argument somewhere else. A baler that cannot hold the rhythm of the cuber creates a queue at the end of the line, and the end of the line is the worst place for a queue, because the packs standing there are already cured, already counted and already promised to a customer.

Where the price of the unit actually sits

Six cost centres carry almost the whole figure. Read each for what it does on site and for what an undersized version costs you later, because five of them are fixed the day the order is placed and only the strap reorder is a running decision you can revise.

• Strapping head and arch. The head feeds strap at 3 m/s, pulls it back at about 160 mm/s and welds a 25 mm joint. The arch decides the largest pack the machine can close, so it is a capability decision and a price decision in the same item.
• Frame and conveyor interface. The frame carries the arch above your conveyor and keeps it square to the pack. Guide rails, stops and interface plates are made to your conveyor width, so two plants ordering the same model can receive different steel.
• Control cabinet. The cabinet runs feed, tension, weld and release, and holds the interlock with the cuber. It is built for 380 V three phase 50 Hz with a protective earth, and that supply has to be confirmed against your site before the order, not after arrival.
• Strap specification. Strap grade is chosen from pack weight and strap count, and consumption per pack follows from that pair. Ask for consumption in metres per pack at your strap count, so the running line in your budget is your own number and not a salesman's estimate.
• Air supply. If the unit needs compressed air, the compressor, receiver and dryer are site scope and they belong in the same budget. Establish at quotation stage whether air treatment comes with the machine.
• Installation on an existing conveyor. The unit weighs about 800 kg and draws 2 kW, so it is a line-mounted machine. What it consumes is production time: the conveyor stops, the frame is aligned, and the interlock is proved with the cuber.

Does a 15 second strap cycle keep up with the cuber?

The arch closes one strap in about 15 seconds on a 1.2 m³ pack, counting feed, tensioning and welding. In continuous running that is 240 strap cycles in an hour. Compare that with the rhythm at which your cuber releases a finished pack, and the answer is arithmetic rather than opinion.

Take a pack of six layers held by four straps. A cuber stacking at 15 to 18 seconds per layer releases that pack every 90 to 108 seconds. The baler needs four cycles of about 15 seconds, so about 60 seconds for the same pack, and it finishes with 30 to 48 seconds in hand. That slack absorbs a re-feed, a pack that arrives out of square, or an operator walking to the panel.

The slack disappears when the strap count rises or the cuber runs faster. At five straps the baler needs 75 seconds, which still fits a release every 90 seconds but not a release every 90 seconds with a stoppage in it. Put straps per pack and seconds between packs on the same page as the price, because that pair decides whether one baler is enough.

What does the translation head change on an existing conveyor?

In a translation machine the head and arch travel along the line instead of the pack turning under a fixed arch. The pack never leaves the conveyor axis, so it reaches the strap position square, and the strap is placed by moving the head. On a retrofit that matters more than any catalogue line, because a pack that has to be turned needs floor space, a turntable and a gap cut into your conveyor.

The product height range of 350 to 1,800 mm also keeps one arch usable across a mixed order book. A pallet of pavers and a stack of hollow blocks pass under the same arch without it being rebuilt for each product, and the pack footprint stays inside the strap loop.

Why the payback is not a monthly figure

Any payback quoted in months rests on three numbers the supplier does not own: your strap price, your labour rate and your breakage rate. Ask for the three separately and the argument becomes something you can defend. Start from what changes on the pack itself, because that is where the money is kept or lost.

An unstrapped cube of cured blocks is held together by friction and by the way it was stacked. It is lifted at the cuber, set down in the yard, lifted again and put on a truck. Each of those moves is a chance for the top layer to shift, and the cost of a shifted pack is paid at the customer's gate on the whole load, not on the strap. A closed pack travels as one unit and is handled as one unit.

Then add the labour line you can actually measure. If one man at the end of the line exists only to stack and tie, the baler removes that post from the shift, and you know that cost exactly because you pay it every month. Set it against the quotation, keep strap consumption as a separate running line, and the payback becomes a subtraction you can show a bank.

Which details should you settle before the order?

Four items belong in the enquiry, and all four are yours rather than the supplier's. With them written down, the quotation becomes a sizing exercise instead of a catalogue reading.

• Destination and supply. State the voltage and frequency at the plant, because 380 V three phase 50 Hz with a protective earth is a build specification, not a formality.
• Pack size. Give the footprint and the finished height of the packs you actually ship, inside the 350 to 1,800 mm range, and say whether they stand on pallets or on the floor.
• Straps per pack and pack rhythm. These two numbers decide whether one baler covers the line, and nobody can size the machine without both of them.
• Conveyor detail. Height, width and the stop window you can give up for installation, because the frame is made to that conveyor and not to a drawing in a catalogue.