PT Blog
In my last blog I explained why more and more processors have registered to attend the Plastics Technology Extrusion Conference since the event was launched in 2015: To Learn.
The Extrusion Conference is the only conference of its type: sessions devoted to general extrusion—issues that pertain to all extrusion processors regardless of what comes out of their die—coupled with breakout sessions on specific kinds of extrusion: Film, Sheet, Pipe/Profile/Tubing and Compounding.
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Circular Economy will be celebrated by Engel at K 2019.
Complex geometry of these crates poses a tricky test for Engel’s skinmelt sandwich co-injection molding process, to be demonstrated at K 2019. Despite the challenge, Engel says it achieved >50% recycled PP in the crates.
In the outdoor exhibition area between Halls 10 and 16 at K, Engel will mold mini waste containers from post-consumer waste.
Under the shadow of spreading bans of single-use plastic products and growing public concern over “ocean plastics” pollution, the dominant theme at this October’s K 2019 show in Dusseldorf, Germany, will be recycling, under the currently fashionable label of “Circular Economy.”
Visitors will hear plenty about this, to be sure, from suppliers of materials and additives, and builders of machinery for reclamation of waste plastics.
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So why have processors registered to attend the Plastics Technology Extrusion Conference in increasing numbers every year since the event was launched in 2015?
Two words: To Learn. Since we started the Extrusion Conference in 2015 in Charlotte, N.C., attendance has climbed every year. Last year’s event drew a total of 573 people; more than 320 of those were extrusion processors (the rest were speakers and exhibitors) who paid hard-earned money to listen to presentations by the industry’s thought leaders so that they could learn—there’s that word again—how to run their operation more effectively.
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Milacron’s Kortec co-injection technology allows for the simultaneous co-injection of two materials, essentially doubling the output of standard multi-component molding solutions.
Kortec’s co-injection technology allows precise control of the various layers, including in preform applications.
“A lot of our customers are still confused,” says Cheryl Sayer, director of engineering at Kortec. “They think it’s two-shot overmolding—sealing off on plastic instead of steel—rather than the skin and the core being injected simultaneously.”
That simultaneous injection means there is no cycle-time penalty resulting from waiting for one injection unit to finish before the other can start, and it also doubles mold output compared to traditional two-shot molding where a substrate is molded in one cavity and then transferred to another (or the mold itself must rotate) and a second material is overmolded. “If you can co-inject,” Sayer says, “you automatically double the cavitation of a tool.”
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The K 2019 Preview featured 12 press conferences held by K exhibitors over three days in Düsseldorf, Germany. All images courtesy of Messe Düsseldorf.
The K 2019 Preview kicked off with a roundtable discussion featuring from L-R: Ulrich Reifenhäuser, CEO of the Reifenhäuser Group; Oliver Möllenstädt, executive director GKV, Germany Association of Plastics Converters; Rüdiger Baunemann of PlasticsEurope; Boris Engelhardt, secretary general of the Association of the German Rubber Industry; Erhard Wienkamp, Executive Director Foreign Trade Fairs Division for Messe Düsseldorf; and moderator Arnie Birken.
If anyone needs a reminder of how truly global the plastics industry is—K 2019 (October 16-23; Düsseldorf, Germany) will surely do so. The last K in 2016 recorded 3,293 exhibitors from 61 countries, attracted 232,053 trade visitors, including 71 percent from outside Germany.
As a tradition, Messe Düsseldorf invited around 80 journalists from 32 countries for the K 2019 Preview from July 1-3. During 12 press conferences held by K exhibitors over three days in Düsseldorf, there was plenty of product news.
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