Being an Engineer
Being an Engineer
S6E51 Eric Richins | What It's Like Being A Packaging Engineer
Join us on-site at Stryker as we explore the world of packaging engineering with Eric Richins, a packaging engineer with 10 years of experience in the industry. In this insightful interview, Eric discusses the various aspects of packaging from primary to tertiary, highlighting the importance of packaging in maintaining product sterility and efficiency in production. He shares intriguing details about the automation of packaging processes, the regulatory challenges faced, and the critical role packaging plays in the medical device industry. Eric offers a behind-the-scenes look at the complexities of packaging engineering and what it takes to ensure seamless operations. Tune in to learn about the nuances of this often-overlooked field and the unique skills required to excel in it.
Aaron Moncur, host
About Being An Engineer
The Being An Engineer podcast is a repository for industry knowledge and a tool through which engineers learn about and connect with relevant companies, technologies, people resources, and opportunities. We feature successful mechanical engineers and interview engineers who are passionate about their work and who made a great impact on the engineering community.
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Okay, we're on site here at Stryker. This is kind of a new format for us. First time that we've done something on site here at someone else's facility, and we've got Eric Richins that we're talking to today. He is a packaging engineer, and packaging is not something that we've talked about on the podcast. So we thought we'd just do kind of a short, 1015, minute interview here learn a little bit what packaging engineering is all about, maybe some pro tips and and then we'll call it a day. So Eric, why don't you just introduce yourself quickly and tell us a little bit about like, what, what is a packaging engine engineer? What do you do?
Eric Richins:I am Eric Richins. I have been here at Stryker about 10 years, mostly dealing with the packaging on a manufacturing level. So there's two different kinds of packaging engineers. You've got ones that do the design work and work with suppliers and things like that, artwork, designs and different things I do mostly on the manufacturing side. Okay? So I deal with processes, improvements, automation, you know, day to day operations, make sure that everything runs smoothly, that the lines keep running, take care of any problems, fix any, you know, systemic issues, stuff like that. I also do all the implementation of any kind of sustaining projects, so if they have artwork changes or like, you know, regulatory, you know, label design, different things like that that need to be implemented. I do all that kind of stuff. So I update like, you know, the dhrs, the device history records, update those, update the bill of materials, update our component verification systems, all that kind of stuff, anything that's on the operation side I take care of.
Aaron Moncur:And when we talk about packaging, I mean, what is packaging? Are we talking about the brown corrugated box that things go inside of, what they ship? Are we talking about Tyvek pouches? Are we talking about the cosmetic cartons that devices go on? Is it all of the above?
Eric Richins:It's all of the above. So we have, like, primary packaging, and we have tertiary packaging, what they call so primary packaging is anything that touches the device itself. Secondary packaging would be anything that's inside the sterile barrier. And then tertiary packaging is everything outside the sterile barrier. So, like our devices are very small. They go into a hoop, they get coiled. Go into hoop. They get accessories put on them. They go into a pouch, get sealed, get labeled. Those go into a garden, get clothes, get labeled. Those go into a shipper box, get closed, get labeled. They go off to sterilization. So all that kind of stuff that's all included in the packaging. So anything that's not part of the device itself that the doctor uses, we consider packaging
Aaron Moncur:Okay, and what's the difference between packaging that touches the device and packaging that's within the what did you call it? The sterile barrier barrier?
Eric Richins:So it all has to do with like, validations, like how you validate your products, like anything that goes inside the sterile barrier. So the sterile barrier for us is the pouch. So it's a film on one side, it's Tyvek on the other side. And Tyvek is designed to allow gas to get in, but it doesn't allow microbials to get in, so it's a very special design stuff. So that's our sterile barrier. So that gets sealed completely around so inside, once it goes out and gets basically gets gassed. We're saying that everything inside that pout is now sterile, okay? And so everything outside of that, like your labels, your cartons, that's all outside the sterile barrier, and so that is less restricted from, like, a regulatory standpoint.
Aaron Moncur:And when you say, get gas, this is like ethylene oxide sterilization.
Eric Richins:EO, yeah, we do have some of our older products go to gamma sterilization. So it's a big they call it blue cobalt. So it's just a wall of radioactive material. Oh, wow. And our product goes in front of it, goes back and forth, back and forth, just one shipper box at a time. Okay, we'll go back and forth in front of that wall so it gets irradiated. That kills all the microbials in it. So those are two different the other one is just a big gas chamber. It goes in we put we call them PCDS. It's basically little capsules with bacteria in it. And they put that all over a pallet. They put the pallet into the chamber, they get it gassed, and then they test those little bacteria capsules, make sure that they're dead. Basically got it okay.
Aaron Moncur:Can you think of a project in particular that was interesting or particularly challenging, any stories that you can share around that
Eric Richins:like we just went live or just had our year? Mark on automating our packaging process. So our cartons are very thin square. It's very difficult to open and close them and put them in. So we just implemented the machine that does six a minute or no, sorry, 10 minutes, one every six seconds, produces one of those units for us. So our we usually run lot size, about 400 so it'd take a person to do that about three hours, where the machine can do it in about 45 minutes. Wow. And so as a matter of getting the machine running at speed, you know, minimizing downtime, dealing with issues and problems, and, you know, a timely manner. You know, root cause analysis, all that kind of stuff is a lot of my job. So I feel
Aaron Moncur:like when engineers think about product design and medical devices, the part that comes to mind first is maybe like the R D or the CAD work designing it, but maybe the packaging doesn't get the attention that it deserves. Is that ever crossed your mind? Or is that something that people talk about?
Eric Richins:The packaging is pretty basic. I mean, it has to be what it has to be like. You have to maintain that sterility of the product, things that are going into people's bodies, so we have to make sure that they're very you know, so to do a change or do an update to it, there's still much regulatory hoops you have to jump through. The changes take a long time. Like, we just had update everything for Europe. They changed all their regular regulations on us, and that project took seven years, wow, just to change, like, some wording on labels and stuff. Like, really, it was a very big project. It's, it's kind of hard to comprehend, like my work on that project, maybe only took me six months, but all the back end work, you know, from our partners, to get everything approved, to get all that through all these regulatory bodies, it takes a long time. So it's very rare that we get major changes to anything like, when we roll out a new product, it's easiest for us to duplicate what we've done in the past, yeah, as opposed to come up with something new, you know, they're always, you know, our packaging engineers that do the design side, they're always trying to come up with these new ideas and these different things. Oh, what if we do this? But in reality, the changes are something as simple as I'm going to add a little bit of color to this corner of our carton so it looks slightly different than our other products of that same that same brand kind of a thing. So it's very subtle the things that they're allowed to do, just because of all the regulations that have to do with medical device
Aaron Moncur:outside of the typical foundational engineering knowledge and education. Is there any specific training or skill sets that one needs to develop to become a packaging engineer?
Eric Richins:You can actually, there's degrees in packaging engineering. Oh, is that right? You can do they're mostly back east, okay, those are more focused on materials and design and stuff like that. So, like, what I do is more, it's closer to, like a mechanical engineer or a process engineer is, you know, the day to day. Like, I don't know of any schools that teach you, like, root cause analysis and stuff like that, like the different techniques and things. So those are usually supplemented. Once you get into, you know, a company, they want you to learn these kinds of things. They send you to different classes. You know, they have your six sigmas. You got your, I don't know if you know, like, there's yellow belts, green belts, black belts, kind of like in karate, yeah, you have those levels for engineers, like different classes. You can take different projects. You have to finish different amount of experience that you need before you can actually learn these kinds of techniques. And a lot of it is just learning to look at the world a little bit differently than everyday stuff. So it's, it's for me, it's fun, it's what I enjoy doing. So like I started off in quality, I worked in project management for years and years and years, and our packaging engineers kept quitting on us. And so to get my projects to move forward, I had to do their job for them. And I found I really enjoyed it, and I just had opportunities. Every time I had an opportunity to get in a little bit deeper into that field. You know, gradually moved away from project management into this kind of a role where you're just supporting production and things like that. So it's I find it interesting. It works well with the way my brain works. You know, I don't like working with suppliers. I don't really enjoy designing simple things. So I moved away from that side of the packaging engineer, move more into the production type of a thing. So that's just what I enjoy doing.
Aaron Moncur:What aspect of that do you like the most, and is there anything about it that you wish you didn't have to do?
Eric Richins:Yeah, I mean, a lot of people will complain about like, you come into work and they call it firefighting. So there's a problem it needs solving. And you know, they're like, oh, firefighting all day today. For me, that's the most enjoyable. Oh, okay. If I come into work, the first thing I do is I check, you know, my team's messages for production, and I look and say, Hey, were there any issues with last night when they run? Are there any issues they're dealing with this morning that I need my attention type of the thing. And, you know, that's like, my main priority. That's what I want to do. I want to come in. I want to fix issues. So, like you were out there with me on the line, we were having some crashing issues. I want to get my hands dirty. I want to get in there and figure out, hey, what's causing this, you know, watch it happen. You know, see it happen, and be like, okay, you know. And that gives me pretty good satisfaction when you can fix a problem, especially if you can do it pretty quickly. Here just be like, you know, sometimes, if the problem is intermittent, it takes a long time to figure it out what's causing it. But, you know, that's kind of what I enjoy,
Aaron Moncur:yeah, anything that you wish you didn't have to do as a packaging engineer, like for mechanical engineers, I think it's drawings, right? Like no engineer enjoys creating drawings and documentation. Is there something analogous to that in the packaging world, the
Eric Richins:packaging world, that I don't like doing? No offense to the packaging engineers, but sometimes some of their ideas or things, they don't look at it from a production standpoint. They're looking at from, hey, this is what the doctors want. This is what marketing wants. We want to make these changes, and they don't look at how it affects us, yeah, until kind of after the fact we have to deal with the outcome, yeah, kind of a thing like, you know, they have two products that are very similar, but they want to introduce new artwork for the two of them, and they want to incorporate into, like, a carton. So now I have to deal with two cartons instead of just one carton, and that cascades into 1020, you know, that kind of things. Yeah, that's probably, you know, the biggest headache I have, at least currently, is dealing with these little minute changes that they want to make to something that makes my life more difficult, you know, from a production standpoint. So I'm all about, you know, we want to do everything you know, quality, safety, quality, and then you got to hit those numbers. You know that efficiency is kind of the thing. That's where I come in, you know, I make sure, yeah, we're being safe, yeah, we're following a quality, quality policies. But I want to make sure that everything happens as efficiently as we possibly can. You know, least amount of headaches for our or the people to build our products. I want them to be happy. I want their lives to be as easy as possible. That's kind of like my goal and my job.
Aaron Moncur:And when we talk about packaging, I feel like, if you're not familiar with that, that niche in the industry, you might just think, oh, what's what's hard about that? It's just you have a box and you put something in it, like, what's the big deal, right? And maybe, when it's manual, that's probably still oversimplifying things. But when you get into automation, like you just talked about this, this automated line that you guys have right now for packaging, it's very sophisticated, right? A lot that can go wrong, yeah?
Eric Richins:Like, you have to take everything that a person does and have a machine do it, yeah? And you can't cut any corners. You can't, like, if the person has to, you know, verify that this is the right part. You're having to do it. The machine has to do that kind of thing too. So you have to build all that into it. And, you know, at the same time, make it very user friendly, make sure that it is robust. Can you understand the test of time, all that kind of stuff? So it's a very complicated, yeah. So it's like, you have to do all kinds of, like, validations and process builds and all these different things. So, like, we just had an auditor come through, and she's like, oh, I want to see the validations you did for, you know, your packaging machine. We're like, Okay, which one she's like, you know, like your IQ, like your installation qualifications, you're operating your equipment, qualifications, your process, you know, verifications. And so I pulled the documents for and like, our installation or equipment setup was 400 pages, our process validation saying, Hey, we can consistently run this for all our different products and things like that was over 600 pages documentations that we had to do just to make sure, hey, this machine does what we want it to do, yeah, does what we need it to do, and can do it consistently. That's incredible. Yeah, that's so much work,
Aaron Moncur:and it's doing a lot. I mean, it's, it's taking these flat cartons, it's erecting them, it's putting a product inside. It's folding the tabs closed. It's putting a shipping label on it, or a product label, putting it into a shipping box. So there's a lot, lot of steps that go into it, yeah.
Eric Richins:So it was, you know, we had, like, the perfect machine, you know, design, you know, like in our user specifications, a lot of that gets cut out just because of costs and time and things like that. You know, it's not as integrated as we would like. We don't have access to the software like we would like. But for bare bones, for what our you know, management. Approved. It does exactly what we need it to do when it's working, yeah, and it's not breaking down for the most part. You know that's it's pretty consistent for its output. Like, we can plan now and be like, okay, we can expect this number of units every day to be produced by this unless there's some kind of hiccup, like, on a perfect day. We'll never say it's going to be, we won't commit to that. But, you know, for the most part, our planners, our schedulers, everything we can build that be like, Okay, this is what we can expect from it, yeah. So, yeah, you know, took a year before we got there, and there was a lot of questions. You know, this is what was promised, you know, by, you know, our engineering team, and this is actual what it's going to do, you know, it was a lot of back and forth, you know, understanding, yeah, you know, we didn't plan for these kinds of things, you know, we didn't say, you know, they told us, you know, the ideal situation, that's how many units it can do. This is how long a lot will take. This is how long it take to switch between lots, all that kind of stuff was, you know, kind of put out there. But in reality, everything takes, there's always some little hiccup. The machine doesn't run perfect. You know, maybe for like an hour, it runs great, but then, you know, you have a little bit downtime here, there just, you know, just understanding all of that, yeah, setting realistic expectations is kind of what we do, which
Aaron Moncur:is, this is par for the course with engineering, right? Anytime you bring up a new product or a new system, they're going to be problems, they're going to be bugs, and that's just how it goes. That's part of the process, yeah, yeah. And that's, you know, the job, basically, right? That's why you have a job,
Eric Richins:you know, a lot of people are worried about, like, you know, AI taking your career or something like that, engineering work, what we do, I don't see that happening soon, yeah, probably will someday, eventually, yeah. But, you know, the learning, the knowledge that you have and is just, you know, the type of thinking that you have is very unique, yeah, in the engineering world. Yeah, great. It's a nice challenge. It keeps you engaged, like in your work, yeah?
Aaron Moncur:Awesome. Anything else that you think engineers should know about the world of packaging before we wrap things
Eric Richins:up here. I mean, it's not as simple like you're saying, it's not as simple as what people expect it. There's a lot of little things, little nuances that go into it. You know, the packaging of a product is just as important as the product itself. Like you put the wrong label on something, you put the wrong packaging around it, you're not going to, it's going to confuse your customers. It's going to, you know, cause chaos with your distribution and that kind of a thing. So it has to be, it's just as important to get your packaging right as it is to get whatever it is you're selling right on it. So a lot of, I don't think a lot of people understand that, yeah, that's kind of the world I live in, like you're saying people don't take it seriously. Land is just packaging. Really, nothing is just Yeah. So it's something that, weirdly enough, I found, like, a little niche, that's something I enjoy dealing Yeah? So I've been doing it a long time, like, I've been pushed, pressured to, like, go into management or, like, supervisory roles, because they'll see I've worked really good with our our product builders. Yeah, I engage with them well. And I'm just like, No, I'm fine. I enjoy what I do. Yeah, this is my, my little world that I that takes some discipline, right? I mean, there's probably an an attraction to like, going to management and leadership or whatever, but I think it takes some discipline to recognize it's not really what's going to bring me the most joy. I'm very happy doing what I'm doing right here. I'm just going to keep getting better at this thing, yeah, just make sure everything just goes well, yes. Like, my that's my day. I want everything this be nice and perfect. So like, you know my wife, I go home and she's like, how was your day? I was like, boring. She's like, What? What happened? I'm like, everything went well. There was no problems to be solved. So, you know, that's a good day, yeah, you know, may not be the most interesting day.
Aaron Moncur:Yeah, right. Okay, well, Eric, thanks so much for talking us through process or packaging engineering and all the processes associated with it. I think this is the first time that we've talked about packaging on the podcast, so another great chunk of knowledge to add to the repository.
Eric Richins:All right, I'm glad I could be here for you. Thanks. Spread a little knowledge. That's right.
Aaron Moncur:I'm Aaron Moncur, founder of pipeline design and engineering. If you liked what you heard today. Please share the episode to learn how your team can leverage our team's expertise developing advanced manufacturing processes, automated machines and custom fixtures, complemented with product design and R and D services. Visit us at Team pipeline.us. To join a vibrant community. Of engineers online. Visit the wave dot engineer, thank you for listening. You.
