To study the working and construction of hand operated tablet punch press

Theory

Tablet Compression Machine

Tablets are made by compressing a formulation containing a drug or drugs with excipients on stamping machine called presses. Tablet presses are designed with following basic components: 1) Hopper for holding and feeding granulation 2) Dies that define the size and shape of the tablet. 3) Punches for compressing the granulation within the dies. 4) Cam tracks for guiding the movement of the punches. 5) A feeding mechanism for moving granulation from hopper into the dies

Tablets presses are classified either single punch or multi-station rotary presses.

In case of single punch machine all of the compression is applied by the upper punch, making the single punch machine a “stamping press”.

Hand operated tablet punch press:

Procedure:

To make a tablet, the powder material is placed into the bottom piece, and the handle is depressed and released. The powders are compressed and occupy the size of the gap designed in the punch.

The powder is filled in to the hopper which connected to the hopper shoe located at the dye table.

hopper shoe located at the dye table the powder fid in to the dye by force of gravitation –al force.

When the hopper shoe is located over the die and the powder is fed in to the dye by gravity force.

The amont of powder that has to be filled in to the dye controlled by the position of lower punch.

When the hopper shoe is located in to the dye the upper punch down and powder is compressed.

The lower punch is stationary during compresson and pressure is applied by upper punch.

After ejection the tablet is pushed away by the hopper shoe and as it move back to the dye for the next tablet formation.

The output of the tablet from single punch about 200 tab./min and is useful for small scale production or for research.