Strictly-Extrusion

VTC Silvergate, North Wales, the UK colour and additive masterbatch division of Vita Thermoplastic Compounds, has this week completed the commissioning of an additional Leistritz twin screw extrusion line as part of its ongoing investment but particularly in response to the success of its recently launched brand Quiksilver. Quiksilver is a range of 200 polymer specific masterbatch colours available in up to 10 polymers and deliverable in any quantity from 5 kg to 5 tonnes, within 48 hours of order. The new equipment is a 60 mm twin screw Leistritz ZSE60 and its commissioning, earlier than originally planned, will give VTC Silvergate much needed additional capacity but more particularly greater manufacturing flexibility. The new 60 mm extruder will work alongside VTC Silvergate’s two 55 mm Leistritz lines and it will process predominantly large volume work leaving the two smaller units to handle Quiksilver and small to medium volume lots.

Enercon is pleased to offer converters assistance in the production of radio frequency identification (RFID) tags. RFID is a technology used to track assets throughout the supply chain. Very small RFID transponders or tags containing a unique identifier are placed on assets (pallets, cases, or individual items), and these tags communicate with RFID readers.
Large retailers such as Wal-Mart, Target, and Home Depot have been involved in pilot tests of RFID solutions based on the latest technology and are making plans to require their top 129 suppliers to start equipping arriving pallets and cases with RFID devices in the not-too-distant future, perhaps as early as January 2005, in Wal-Mart’s case.
Enercon’s Plasma3 Atmospheric Plasma Treatment System can be integrated within the production processes of manufacturers of passive and long-range battery-tag RFID systems operating in the UHF and microwave frequency bands.
Plasma3™ ’s cleaning, etching and functionalizing surface treatment process enables manufacturers to optimize tag transmission levels while significantly improving productivity and tag yield.
Enercon Industries Corporation, headquartered in Menomonee Falls, WI, is a major manufacturer of equipment for the plastics and packaging industries. The company supplies custom built corona, flame and atmospheric plasma treating systems, and 3D plasma treaters for the plastics and rubber industries.

Ireland’s Athlone Extrusions has undergone a management buyout from the Quinn Group, for a sum reported at EURO55m. A report in the Irish Times said Athlone managing director James McGee, together with Enda Cunningham and Jackie Brown, had bought the company. A Quinn Group spokesman confirmed the business had been sold. He said the factories in the Czech Republic and at Newbridge, south of Dublin, will remain under Quinn ownership.
Athlone was part of the Barlo Group, which was bought by Northern Irish family firm Quinn Group earlier this year. An MBO at Athlone was originally mooted when Barlo chief executive Dr. Anthony Mullins announced plans to buy out the Barlo Group. When Mullins’ bid failed, the sale of Athlone was put on hold.Athlone Extrusions manufactures extruded sheets and film in PS, ABS and PMMA/ABS.It has installed capacity of around 27,000tpa and has sales offices in Birmingham, UK and Tilburg, the Netherlands.

India’s Essel Propack group has bought Arista Tubes, the UK’s leading producer of extruded plastic tubes for the cosmetic, toiletry, personal care and pharma markets, for an undisclosed sum. Employing 174 people at its Stevenage site, Arista turned over EURO 18.4m last year and carries out a range of operations including decoration, silk screen printing, and foil blocking and stamping.
Arista’s current management team of managing director Jeremy Paul, finance director Ben Stephens, and sales and marketing director Evelyn Tweedlie will continue to run the company’s operations.Based in Mumbai, Essel Propack employs more than 1,500 people and has 17 plants in 11 different countries, supplying laminate tubes for packaging toothpaste, cosmetics and pharmaceuticals. Total capacity is 4.2 billion tubes a year and sales last year amounted to EURO 200m.

To address current production demands for the hygienic and diaper film markets, Davis-Standard has expanded its non-woven coating capabilities to improve processor outputs and product quality while reducing waste. Recent technology has enabled Davis-Standard to develop the industry’s most complete and technically advanced line of non-woven machinery for the hygienic film market. This includes high-speed, wide-width coating systems as well as simplified, lower speed machines. Process capabilities include both wet and dry embossing as well as laminating to non-wovens. Several mono and coextrusion configurations are available to meet specific process parameters and budgets for customers worldwide.
Non-woven systems feature a web width range of 40 to 120 inches (1,000 to 3,000mm) and speed range of 100 to 500 meters per minute (300 to 1,640 feet per minute) using automatic unwinds, manual and zero speed splices to decrease waste. Machinery is designed with a universal web treatment for a broad corona area and web conditioning to improve polymer adhesion to non-woven, spun-bonded PP. Processing advantages include a large OD roll to limit water condensation, coating and laminating options, in-line slitting to narrow widths of 75 mm and jumbo roll winding up to 1.5 meters (5 feet) in diameter. Additionally, Davis-Standard offers cost-saving alternatives such as the Culisse winder, which eliminates the slitting and rewinding steps required for most processes. The high-speed, in-line slitting capabilities and scrapless transfer mechanism of the Culisse have made it a popular replacement for turret
re-winds.
This technology is available from Davis-Standard’s manufacturing facilities in Somerville, New Jersey, USA, as well as Erkrath, Germany. To schedule a non-woven equipment presentation, customers can call Steve Post (908) 722-6000 (USA) or Volkmar Mehnert 49-211-2404-0 (Germany).

Sophisticated process technology combined with automation dedicated to application requirements. The new generation of blown film extrusion lines under the KIRION® brand name which were first presented to the industry at the previous “K” in Düsseldorf in 2001 prove these very characteristics. Three years later, this system supplier from Worms has demonstrated that it has consistently followed the same path that it chose then. The company’s management team, Edgar Gandelheidt (Managing Director), Kurt Freye (Director of Sales Worldwide) and Dr Jochen Hennes (Technical Director) will present innovations at this year’s K’ Show, the international fair for plastics and rubber from 20th to 27th October, at stand C 42 in hall 17, that are characterized by enhanced user friendliness and by further rationalization of working procedures in the production of blown film.

Trade visitors in Düsseldorf will be able to observe a 3-layer line, showing the function of improved management of residual resins at the vacuum conveyor, as well as the most modern gravimetric metering units using variable range motors. Both of these elements of the modular extrusion line may be easily adjusted and controlled via the KIRION® C automation software. The new ultrasonic bubble control system is a new enhanced function integrated in the KIRION® C control system which allows width control to be significantly improved through an integration of the IBC control system and a servomotor-driven high speed fine adjustment unit in combination with the width measurement system.

But above all, it is in three additional modules that Kiefel Extrusion has achieved decisive progress that will be presented in October. First, industry experts will be impressed by improvements in cooling that contribute to increased output, better film clarity, and greater bubble stability. Second, AC vector direct drives for the extruders that finally make drive belts redundant, saves valuable installation space, and ensures easier maintenance, and finally its’ 9-layer die.

Kiefels’ engineers in Worms have succeeded with further developments that ensure the best possible film quality, such as a new haul-off in an extremely robust design, conceived in particular for large lay-flat widths up to 3.6 meters, and a new “cascade” width control system. A lay-flat package to produce film without bagging or necking is also now a part of the new KIRION® generation. This way Kiefel Extrusion can offer, for the first time, a solution for a significant increase in film flatness quality. And there are also new novelties to be expected in film collapsing. In detail, it means NC adjustment, use of brush rollers, and flattening in width while collapsing the bubble.

Regarding winders, the second largest business area for KIEFEL, the company confirms its technological leadership with a number of developments, such as a new refined winding shaft handling system that enables uncomplicated handling of rolls shafts as well as rolls, whether manual, semi-automatic, or fully automatic. Especially exciting after having invested many hours of development work is a new patented splicing device with which the direction of rotation can be reversed and winding made without the need for re-webbing.

For those visitors who are interested in learning more about further technical details of the KIRION® systems, KIEFEL is offering a shuttle between the fair and its factory in Worms every day during the K’ show. There, in the laboratory, a 7-layer line will be producing barrier film for one of their existing customers running EVOH and PA films, 24 hours around the clock. A radiometric thickness measurement system that is completely integrated in the KIRION® C will also be shown on this line.

German sheet manufacturer Simona is to exhibit twinwall sheet for thermoforming fuel tanks on its stand at the K2004 show. The decision to show the sheet follows the start-up of a new sheet extrusion plant at the company’s Kirn headquarters at the end of 2003; Delphi also successfully introduced thermoformed fuel tanks using the new sheets from Simona this year.
The co-extruded seven-layer sheet is made with an ethylene vinyl alcohol (EVOH) barrier layer and a two adhesion promoter layers and can be made in width up to 2.4 metres. The company claimed that future low-emission requirements for fuel tanks “can be met with ease”.
Thermoformed fuel tanks have now been introduced at European automotive OEMs by both Delphi and Visteon, as an alternative to the traditional blow moulded tanks. The twinwall sheets for the Visteon tanks are made by Spartech at a new extrusion plant in Donchery, France.

Dutch rubber machinery firm VMI Epe Holland has acquired the extrusion machinery division of AZ Formen und Maschinen in Runding, Germany. The business has annual sales of EURO 8m and employs 30 people, supplying the new tyre, retread and technical rubber industries.
VMI specialises in machinery for car and truck tyre manufacturing, as well as millroom and rubber injection moulding machines. It has plants in the Netherlands, the US and China employing 500 staff in total.
VMI president and chief executive Coos Spanjer said there was no plan to move the operations from Runding, which is near the Czech border, though the extrusion machinery would be serviced at VMI’s three other sites.
He hoped that bringing the extrusion business within VMI would extend its geographical reach and increase sales of extrusion machines to new markets. “Their exposure was limited to Europe and North America – we can help them expand.”
Order intake at VMI was at a “good level”, Spanjer said, due to tyre companies making more profits and being in a better position to make investments. The trend towards radial tyres is still having a positive effect on new machine order, as is the fashion for fat, low profile tyres.

Coperion has taken over Chinese extruder manufacturer Nanjing Keya and plans to sell jointly developed extruders worldwide.
Nanjing Keya was set up in 1993 and claims 60 per cent of the Chinese twin screw extruder market, with more than 2,300 machines installed. Trading as Coperion Keya the company plans to build a new production plant at Nanjing in mid-2005. This will build, among other things, a new line of machines developed with Coperion to be sold worldwide as the STS - standard twin screw - series.

Find out what’s new in surface treating with a visit Enercon USA’s booth 13/B59-28. As the only manufacturer of atmospheric plasma, corona and flame surface treating, Enercon is the proven leader in developing long lasting treatments and advanced surface morphology. The company’s Plasma3™ is ideal for specialty applications requiring stringent surface specifications, improved hydrophilicity and precise surface coating performance. See this exciting technology at Enercon Ltd.’s booth 12/C51-6 where they will exhibit a narrow web atmospheric plasma system.
Enercon’s wide range of systems include the company’s revolutionary ThermaGlide™ which virtually eliminates electrode warping on ultrawide lines and a complete range of three-dimensional treaters.
Innovative induction sealing systems will also be on display. Extensive sealing head design capabilities allow Enercon to solve the toughest applications. This expertise has led to the creation of new capless sealing systems that offer energy savings and greater effciencies than conduction sealing. Replace conduction and take advantage of cleaner and cooler operation, instantaneous start-up and operation, high speed production capability, virtually no maintenance, and improved safety.
Enercon Industries Corporation, headquartered in Menomonee Falls, WI, is a major manufacturer of equipment for the plastics and packaging industries. The company supplies custom built corona, flame and atmospheric plasma treating systems, and 3D plasma treaters for the plastics and rubber industries. Enercon also supplies a complete range of automatic and semi-automatic induction cap sealers.