Strictly-Extrusion

UK polyethylene film manufacturer Flexfilm has invested £1m in a new blown film extrusion line for its plant in Cheshire. The new line from Italian manufacturer CMG will raise Flexfilm’s production scapacity by 54% to 10,000tpa. It will also allow it to produce films in widths up to 2,600mm, opening up markets for bigger and heavier reels. Flexfilm’s site in Winsford has been extended by approximately 500 sq metres to accommodate the new machinery. The investment will also create a handful of jobs at the firm, which currently employs 24 staff. Over the last three years Flexfilm has invested heavily in its Northern Ireland sister company, Jordan Plastics, adding extrusion and slitting equipment.

A new blown film line from the Davis-Standard, LLC Converting Systems Group has enabled Raven Industries of Sioux Falls, S.D., to expand its product development and commercial manufacturing capabilities. Raven, a leading U.S. supplier of construction, agriculture and industrial packaging films, installed the five-layer system last spring to develop new products using nylon and EVOH resins. The machine features five extruders and an oscillating haul-off with gusset ability for bag production. An EPIC control system provided extensive recording ability using commercial hardware and software. Several products are currently being evaluated by customers, which Raven hopes to move into production shortly. The 64-inch wide (1,600mm) line is also used for conventional polyolefin product manufacturing.
“Davis-Standard’s Converting Systems Group is easy to work with and the field technical support personnel are excellent,” said Gary Kolbasuk, senior product development engineer at Raven Industries. “This is our first line with more than three layers and the only one we use for nylon and EVOH. It has given us greater capacity to develop new products while servicing our growing production demands.”
Raven’s engineered films division supplies a broad range of monolayer, co-extruded and scrim-reinforced films. The company extrudes, laminates and converts very low to high density polyethylene and polypropylene films ranging from ultra thin .25 mil to 40 mil in thickness. Much of Raven’s film is used in-house on the company’s lamination lines where a reinforcement material such as polyester scrim is added. The reinforced films are then fabricated into larger sheets or tarps. Raven’s key product lines encompass precise packaging film, high-strength construction films and puncture-
resistant geomembrane liners. Films manufactured by Raven are being used in the continued disaster relief effort of Hurricane Katrina.
In addition to the five-layer line, Raven recently purchased unwind stations and winders from Davis-Standard. For more information about Raven Industries, visit www.ravenind.com. For more information about the blown film capabilities of Davis-Standard’s Converting Systems Group, contact Rick Keller at kellerr@bc-egan.com.

The largest agricultural film production line ever built by Reifenhauser, Germany, is now operating at Armando Alvarez group’s facility in southern Spain. The 35m high machine is capable of producing three-layer blown film with a maximum output capacity of 2,200 kg / hour. Film circumferences up to 18.5m can be achieved in thicknesses from 0.08 to 0.2 mm. The line produces film used mainly in the construction of greenhouses, although tunnel film for vegetable growing and field covering films (for mulching and crop forcing) can also be produced.

Ampacet has installed a new twin screw extruder for colour masterbatch at its Telford facility in the UK. The new extruder forms part of a £2m (E3m) investment the US company has made in the Telford plant since it took over Polycolour in 2003. It joins three other extrusion lines at the site. The extruder was supplied by TSA of Italy to an Ampacet specification. It has a 63mm rotating twin screw with 150kW A/C drive.
A technical laboratory was also installed at the facility for local colour matching and product development, physical testing and quality control of the extrusion lines. It is linked by computer to Ampacet’s central technical centre in Messancy, Belgium, to provide more in-depth technical analysis.