A brief overview of airless bottle packaging quality inspection standards

Introduction: The standards are based on published national standards，industry standards, and enterprise standards of brand owners and suppliers. The standards in this article are for reference only for brand owners when purchasing packaging materials. The specific standards should be based on the individual standards of each brand owner or the standards of their cooperating suppliers.

ONE

Standard definition

1. Target Audience:

This article is applicable to the inspection of various daily chemical vacuum bottles and is for reference only.

2. Terms and Definitions

Definition of primary and secondary surfaces: The product appearance should be assessed according to the importance of the surfaces under normal use conditions; Primary surfaces: The exposed parts that are of concern after the overall assembly, such as the top, middle, and visually prominent areas of the product.

Secondary aspects: After the overall assembly, the hidden parts and exposed parts that are not noticed or are not easily discovered. Such as the bottom of the product.

3. Quality Defect Level

Fatal flaw: It violates relevant laws and regulations, or may cause harm to the human body during production, transportation, sales and use.

Critical defects: These are defects that affect functional quality and safety due to structural quality issues, directly impacting product sales or causing the sold product to fail to meet expectations, or causing discomfort to consumers during use.

General defects: These are defects that affect the appearance quality but do not impact the product's structure or functional experience, nor do they significantly affect the product's shape. However, they cause discomfort to consumers during use.

TWO

Appearance quality requirements

1. Basic Appearance Standards:

Vacuum bottles should be intact and smooth, free from cracks, burrs, deformation, oil stains, and shrinkage, with clear and full threads. Vacuum bottles and lotion bottles should have intact, stable, and smooth bodies, with straight, smooth mouths, full threads, free from burrs, holes, obvious scars, stains, and deformation, and no obvious misalignment of the parting line. Transparent bottles should be clear and transparent.

2. Surface and graphic printing

        Color difference: The color is uniform, conforming to the specified color or within the range of the color sample.

Printing and hot stamping (gold/silver): The font and pattern should be correct, clear, and uniform, without obvious skew, misalignment, or defects; the hot stamping (gold/silver) should be complete, without omissions, misalignments, obvious overlaps, or jagged edges.

Wipe the printed area twice with gauze soaked in rubbing alcohol; there should be no printing fading or hot stamping (gold/silver) peeling.

3. Adhesion requirements:

Hot stamping/printing adhesion

Cover the printed/hot stamped areas with 3M 600 ink, smooth and press back and forth 10 times to remove air bubbles, then peel it off instantly at a 45-degree angle. No printing or hot stamping should peel off. Slight peeling is acceptable as it does not affect overall recognizability. For gold or silver hot stamping, peel off slowly.

Electroplating/Spray Coating Adhesion

Using a utility knife, score 4-6 squares with sides of approximately 0.2cm on the electroplated/sprayed area (scratch the electroplated/sprayed coating only). Apply 3M-810 tape to the squares and wait 1 minute before quickly and forcefully peeling it off at a 45°-90° angle. No tape should come off.

4. Hygiene Requirements

Clean inside and out, free of loose contaminants and ink stains.

THREE

Structural quality requirements

1. Size control

Dimensional Control: All assembled products after cooling must have dimensions within tolerance limits to ensure proper assembly and avoid hindering packaging. Key dimensions related to function include: (e.g., the size of the opening seal); internal dimensions related to filling (e.g., dimensions related to full capacity); and external dimensions related to packaging (e.g., length, width, and height). All assembled parts after cooling must be inspected with calipers for dimensions affecting function and hindering packaging. Dimensional accuracy errors affecting functional fit must be ≤0.5mm, and overall dimensions affecting packaging must be ≤1.0mm.

2. The inner and outer bottles should be properly secured with appropriate tightness; the tension required for assembling the inner sleeve and outer bottle should be ≥50N; there should be no friction between the inner and outer bottles to prevent scratches.

3. Dispensing Volume,volume, Initial Dispensing: Fill the bottle 3/4 full with colored water or solvent. Tightly engage the pump head and lock it to the bottle. Manually press the pump head 3-9 times to dispense liquid, ensuring the dispensing volume and quantity are within the set range. Place the measuring cup stably on the electronic scale, zero it, and then dispense liquid into the container. The dispensing volume is calculated as: Dispensing liquid weight ÷ Number of dispensing cycles. A single dispensing volume deviation of ±15% is allowed, and the average deviation is allowed at 5-10%. (The dispensing volume should be based on the pump type selected by the customer for sample sealing or the customer's specific requirements.)

4. Number of dispensing: Fill the bottle with 3/4 colored water or emulsion. Press the pump head cap firmly against the locking teeth of the bottle. The first spray should not exceed 8 times (colored water) or 10 times (emulsion), or refer to the sealed sample and follow the specific evaluation standards.

5. Bottle Capacity: Place the product to be tested stably on the electronic scale, zero the scale, pour water into the container, and use the data displayed on the electronic scale as the test volume. The test data must be within the design requirements.

6. Airless bottle and matching requirements

A. Piston-assisted sealing test: After the product has cooled naturally for 4 hours, the piston and tube are assembled, filled with water, and left for 4 hours. There should be resistance, but no leakage. Extrusion test: After 4 hours, an extrusion test is performed with a pump until all contents are extruded, at which point the piston should be able to move to the top.

B. When pressing and spraying with the pump head, the feel should be smooth and there should be no obstruction.

C. The cap and bottle body should rotate smoothly without jamming when threaded together; the outer and inner caps should be properly assembled without any misalignment or misalignment; the inner cap should not fall off under an axial tensile force of ≥30N; the gasket should not fall off under a tensile force of ≥1N; the outer cap and corresponding bottle body should have a threaded fit with a clearance of 0.1～0.8mm. Alumina parts should be glued to the corresponding cap and bottle body, and after 24 hours of curing, the tensile force should be ≥50N.

FOUR

Functional quality requirements

1. Sealing test requirements: No leakage is allowed after passing the vacuum chamber test.

2. Thread Torque: Fix the assembled bottle or can onto the torque meter's special fixture, and rotate the cap by hand until the required force is reached, based on the data displayed on the torque meter. The torque value corresponding to the thread diameter should conform to the specifications in the appendix. Vacuum bottles and emulsion bottles should not exhibit stripping within the specified rotational torque value.

3. High and low temperature test: The bottle body shows no deformation, discoloration, cracking, leakage, or other phenomena.

4. Compatibility test: No obvious discoloration or peeling, and will not be misidentified.

FIVE

Acceptance method reference

1. Appearance inspection environment:

100W cool white fluorescent lamp, light source distance from the surface of the object being tested: 50–55 cm (illuminance 500–550 LUX). Distance between the object's surface and the eye: 30–35 cm.

Angle between the line of sight and the object's surface: 45 ± 15°. Inspection time: ≤12 seconds.

The inspector must have uncorrected or corrected visual acuity of 1.0 or higher and be free of color blindness.

Dimensions: Measure and record the sample dimensions using a ruler or a vernier caliper with an accuracy of 0.02 mm.

Weight: Weigh the sample using an electronic scale with a graduation of 0.01 g and record the value.

Volume: Weigh the sample using an electronic scale with a graduation of 0.01 g, remove the gross weight of the bottle, fill the sample bottle with tap water until it is full, and record the volume conversion value (if necessary, directly pour in the paste or convert the density of water to that of the paste).

2. Sealing performance measurement

Fill the container (such as a bottle) 3/4 full with colored water (60-80% colored water); then tighten the pump head or sealing cap according to the standard, matching the pump head, sealing plug, sealing cap, and other related accessories; place the sample on its side and upside down in the tray (with a piece of white paper pre-placed in the tray) and put it into the vacuum drying oven; lock the vacuum drying oven isolation door, start the vacuum drying oven, evacuate to -0.06 MPa and maintain for 5 minutes; then close the vacuum drying oven and open the vacuum drying oven isolation door；

Remove the sample and observe the white paper on the tray and the sample surface for any water stains. Then, remove the sample and place it upright on the test bench, gently tapping the pump head/sealing cap a few times. Wait 5 seconds and slowly unscrew it (to prevent colored water from being carried out when unscrewing the pump head/sealing cap, which could lead to misjudgment). Observe the area outside the sealed region of the sample for any colored water. Special requirements: If the customer requires a vacuum leak test under certain high-temperature conditions, simply set the temperature of the vacuum drying oven to achieve this condition and follow steps 4.1 to 4.5；

{If the vacuum leakage test negative pressure conditions (negative pressure value/holding time) are inconsistent with the customer's, please conduct the test according to the vacuum leakage test negative pressure conditions finally confirmed with the customer.} Visually inspect the area outside the sealed area of the sample for colorless water. No colorless water indicates acceptance. Colored water indicates rejection. If the colored water outside the piston sealing area inside the container exceeds the second sealing area (lower edge of the piston), it is considered rejection. If it exceeds the first sealing area (upper edge of the piston), the area of colored water will be judged based on the degree of color.

3. Low-temperature test requirements

Vacuum bottles and emulsion bottles filled with clean water (insoluble particles should not exceed 0.002mm) are placed in a refrigerator at -10°C to -15°C for 24 hours. After 2 hours, they are removed and allowed to recover at room temperature. The test should show no cracking, deformation, discoloration, leakage of paste, or leakage of water.

4. High Temperature Test Requirements

Vacuum bottles and emulsion bottles filled with clean water (insoluble particles should not exceed 0.002 mm) are placed in a constant temperature chamber at +50°C ± 2°C for 24 hours. After 2 hours, they are removed and allowed to recover at room temperature. The test should show no signs of cracking, deformation, discoloration, leakage, or water leakage.

SIX

Outer packaging requirements

Packaging cartons must be free of dirt and damage. A plastic protective bag should be placed inside each carton. Bottles and caps that are easily scratched should be packaged in a way that prevents scratching. Each carton should contain a fixed quantity of products, sealed with tape in a T-shape, and must not be mixed. Each shipment must be accompanied by a factory inspection report. The outer carton label must clearly display the product name, specifications, quantity, production date, manufacturer, and other relevant information.