Diagnosing Defects: Determine True Root Cause Before Adjusting a Process
Common defects can have common causes — flash equals worn mold shutoffs, right? Except when they don’t. Trust your eyes, but verify the root cause before adjusting a process.
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Your Business
Prices for PE, PS, PVC, PET Trending Flat; PP to Drop
Despite price increase nominations going into second quarter, it appeared there was potential for generally flat pricing with the exception of a major downward correction for PP.
Read MoreHigh-Tech Molder Goes Digital for QC
Allegheny Performance Plastics turned to 1factory's cloud-based manufacturing quality control software for streamlined, paperless quality systems.
Read MorePrices Up for All Volume Resins
First quarter was ending up with upward pricing, primarily due to higher feedstock costs and not supply/demand fundamentals.
Read MoreProcessing Plant Tour
Scaling New Heights With Vertical Integration
Eden Manufacturing was founded on a vision of vertical integration, adding advanced injection molding capabilities to a base of precision moldmaking and more recently bringing Swiss-type machining capabilities in-house.
Read MoreInside the Florida Recycler Taking on NPE’s 100% Scrap Reuse Goal
Hundreds of tons of demonstration products will be created this week. Commercial Plastics Recycling is striving to recycle ALL of it.
Read MoreEngineering Resins Compounder Expands to Take on More Scrap
Polymer Resources responds to sustainability push by upgrading plant with grinding and shredding equipment to take on both postindustrial and postconsumer reclaim.
Read MoreTechnology in Depth
Delivering Increased Benefits to Greenhouse Films
How Baystar is helping customers deliver better, more reliable production methods to greenhouse agriculture.
Read MoreImpacts of Auto’s Switch to Sustainability
Of all the trends you can see at NPE2024, this one is BIG. Not only is the auto industry transitioning to electrification but there are concerted efforts to modify the materials used, especially polymers, for interior applications.
Read MoreDigital Twin Creates New, Virtual Paths for Robots with Real-World Cycle-Time Impacts
Realtime Robotics seeks to get more robots involved in manufacturing by addressing the biggest current barrier: programming costs.
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KNOWLEDGE CENTERS
Gain in-depth knowledge in processes, products and technology from industry experts
Trending
- How To Design Three-Plate Molds – Part 4
- The Fundamentals of Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning and Their Application to Injection Molding
- Processing Megatrends Drive New Product Developments at NPE2024
- The Role Barrel Temperatures Play in Melting
- Consistent Shots for Consistent Shots
- Four Industry 4.0 Tech Adoption Insights from Indiana Plastics Manufacturers
- Reduce Downtime and Scrap in the Blown Film Industry
- How to Configure Your Twin-Screw Extruder for Mixing: Part 5
- Let's Take a Journey into the World of Molding Thermosets – Part 1
- Use Purging Compounds to Mitigate Processing Challenges of PCR and PIR
Solutions
Fundamentals of Polyethylene – Part 6: PE Performance
Don’t assume you know everything there is to know about PE because it’s been around so long. Here is yet another example of how the performance of PE is influenced by molecular weight and density.
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Screw Design Tips to Boost Productivity
In this collection of articles, two of the industry’s foremost authorities on screw design — Jim Frankland and Mark Spalding — offer their sage advice on screw design...what works, what doesn’t, and what to look for when things start going wrong.
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Fundamentals of Polyethylene – Part 5: Metallocenes
How the development of new catalysts—notably metallocenes—paved the way for the development of material grades never before possible.
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Latest Issue
Essential Reading
Follow These Tips to Fire Up Your Cold Blown Film Line
Firing up a cold blown-film line after a shutdown involves multiple pieces of equipment that all interact. Here’s a look at those components individually and some best practices on how to get your line up and running as quickly and safely as possible.
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Best of Fattori, Tooling Know How
In this collection of articles Jim Fattori offers his insights on a variety of molding-related topics that are bound to make your days on the production floor go a little bit better.
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Polyethylene Fundamentals – Part 4: Failed HDPE Case Study
Injection molders of small fuel tanks learned the hard way that a very small difference in density — 0.6% — could make a large difference in PE stress-crack resistance.
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What You Need to Know About the Design and Operation of Maddock Mixers
Designed properly, all entering solid polymer fragments and certain types of PE gels entering the Maddock mixer can be trapped and dispersed into the matrix resin. But many are not properly designed. Here’s what to look out for.
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Unraveling the Science and Myth Associated With Moisture Analysis — Part 2
Once you’ve selected the right moisture analyzer, the task of method development begins. Don’t skip this step or you’ll run into problems. Here’s what happened in my lab decades ago.
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Fundamentals of Polyethylene – Part 3: Field Failures
Polyethylene parts can fail when an inappropriate density is selected. Let’s look at some examples and examine what happened and why.
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Latest News and Products
Arburg Eyes Assembly Plant in North America
The 101-year-old German company will continue to manufacture machines from its sprawling operation in the Black Forest, but for the first time, it will add assembly outside of the country.
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Wittmann Shifts Some Production out of Austria
Manufacture of several core products, including specific models and sizes of injection molding machines, automation and auxiliaries have shifted out of Austria and into Hungary, Bulgaria and Turkey.
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Boise State Team Wins Circular Plastics Challenge Focused On PET Recovery
NPE2024: The competition is a collaboration between Hillenbrand, Net Impact and Coca Cola.
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Engel Reorients Global Business, Adds Production in Mexico
The Austrian maker of injection molding machines and automation announced at NPE2024 that it will establish optimized sales, logistics and production structures for its three major regions: Europe, Asia and America.
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Globeius Makes NPE Debut With End-Of-Arm-Tooling, Bottle Leak Testing and More
The Miami-based supplier of various plastics technologies also featured a melt-temperature testing system, closed-loop cooling manifolds and its successful mold crane offering.
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LS Mtron’s Outsized NPE2024 Presence Jump-Starts Ambitious North American Market Goals
The Korean maker of injection molding machines featured eight machines in its nearly 14,000-square-foot booth with additional presses at Yushin and Incoe’s booths, as it targets 20% market share.
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Shibaura Machine, NFM Extend License Agreement on Twin-Screw Compounders
NFM to manufacture and sell TEM series of twin-screw compounding extruders for the next 10 years.
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In Memoriam: Mike Sepe
“The Materials Analyst” and long-time contributor to Plastics Technology passes away at 71.
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