Strictly-Extrusion

The US and European plastics operations of Japan’s Daicel Chemical Industries have been bought by a company headed by Daicel’s British managing director. They have been taken over by Clayfield Management whose managing director, Keith Carrington, is also managing director of Daicel Polymers in England and president of Daicel Polymer Compounds in the USA. Daicel is Ticona’s partner in Polyplastics in the Far East, and has substantial chemicals interests outside plastics. It is currently undergoing a rationalisation to concentrate on its core businesses.
The operations bought by Clayfield have been renamed PlastxWorld and will form the basis of an engineering plastics compounding business as well as continuing to make and sell the Daicell Cevian (ABS and SAN) and Novalloy (engineering alloys) ranges in North and South America, Europe, the Middle East and Africa. Over the coming months PlastxWorld will introduce its own range of polymers and compounds.
Clayfield also owns the PolymerMarketPlace.com internet portal and will add a website for PlastxWorld offering on-line data sheets, quotations, colour match requests and order placement.

A new metallocene-catalyzed HDPE (mHDPE) film resin shows an unprecedented mix of premium optics and stiffness. This is the latest addition and the first high-density grade in the mPact line of metallocene polyolefins made with a loop- slurry process by Chevron Phillips Chemical Co., USA. Earlier mPact grades for blown film have densities of 0,916, 0,918 and 0,933 g/cc. New Marlex D449 (0,942 g/cc, 0.8 MI) offers tensile modulus (1% secant) of 89,000 psi MD, 150,000 psi TD; 60d gloss of 127, and 7% haze. It also boasts good blocking resistance and it processes at LLDPE conditions, according to CPChem. The new resin is aimed at film overwrap for paper towels and tissues, food packaging and high-clarity/high-modulus converting film.

A new PVdF copolymer is said to work especially well as a processing aid for extrusion of LLDPE, HDPE and PP films. When added at levels of only 0,02-0,08%, Kynar Flex PPA from Atofina Performance Polymers is said to help increase processing speed while reducing energy consumption, processing temperatures and melt pressure. It also helps prevent blockages in equipment and formation of drops and knots on converting lines. The product has been shown to enhance a film’s transparency and mechanical properties and to eliminate melt fracture and “sharkskin” surface defects. The product is also suitable for use in pipe and cable sheathing.

GE Structured Products Europe has increased its capacity for Lexan polycarbonate film at Bergen op Zoom in Holland. The new extrusion system is located in a clean room and will make polished graphic films, textured films and in-mould decoration films.

Goldtooth Inc., USA, a manufacturer of embossing equipment for the extrusion industry, will produce extrusion dies designed by consultant Brent English, USA. Goldtooth also moved into a new, larger facility in Cottage Grove and added employees to meet expansion needs for extrusion dies and embossing equipment.

South Korea’s LG Chem is planning to increase its output of PVC by a third. LG Chem is planning to increase its PVC capacity from 90,000 tonnes to 1,2 million tonnes by 2005 to meet strong demand from Asia - especially from China. LG Chem is the petrochemicals, electronic materials and industrial materials arm of LG Chemical Co, which was split into three parts on April 1. The company is also planning an expansion of its Chinese joint venture Ningbo LG Yongxing Co, which is to double ABS output to 300,000 tonnes/year by 2003.

A Doppler laser sensor measures the length and speed of film webs for highly accurate speed matching in calendering, coating and laminating operations. The Micro AWS non-contact laser sensor was introduced two years ago by betacontrol GmbH in Germany and is now available here via Baumer of America in Towaco, N.Y. The Micro AWS sensor, used with betacontrol’s Indicon One real-time controller, detects speed and length without slippage, betacontrol says.

The largest Continuous Turbo Mixer - the CTM 500 - has been supplied by the Mixing Technology Division of Thyssen Henschel Industrietechnik GmbH, Kassel/Germany, to the chemical firm of Kaucuk a.s., Kralupy nad Vitavou/Czech Republic, where it is being used for the continuous, high-speed coating of expandable polystyrene (EPS) with wetting and other agents prior to the expansion process. The mixer is capable of a throughput rate of up to 10 tons of EPS per hour. The principal factors influencing the decision to purchase the Turbo Mixer were not only the particularly low capital investment and operating costs but also the fact that a continuous mixer was the only machine capable of achieving such a high throughput rate.
The first six months of service have shown: The CTM 500 features the most advanced and economic technology for this mixing application. Besides the relatively low operating costs, two of the most important advantages for the processor are the very low specific drive load of 0.004 kWh/kg and the minimal space requirement (L´W´H: 4000 mm ´ 1600 mm ´ 3000 mm). The self-cleaning mixing elements permit rapid formulation change-over.
As with all the machines of this series, the basic functional components of the Turbo Mixer are:
· a mixing cylinder with swing-open design and highly polished interior; the CTM 500 cylinder measures 500 mm in diameter and 1,700 mm in length;
· an inner, fixed-speed, rotating screw segment for conveying the material from the inlet to the outlet;
· an outer, counter-rotating, ring-shaped mixing element with variable speed drive for mixing, dispersing and, if required, heating the material.

The mixer is fed by means of a stuffing screw, equipped with a gravimetric metering system for the mix components. The stuffing screw ensures optimum filling of the mixer, even when processing materials with poor free-flowing properties. Liquid additives can be injected directly into the mixing cylinder.