Materials Handling: Auxiliary suppliers innovate to save customers time, money

At the Plastics Shop Floor Expo in June in Rosemont, Ill., AAE introduced several upgrades to the MovaColor line for injection molding and extrusion, including Quick-Clean clamps and a production sample port.

The Quick-Clean clamps save time and increase productivity by making color changes faster and easier. On many brands of color feeders, when the user needs to clean the neckpiece for a changeover, he or she has to remove a handful of tiny screws. The Quick-Clean clamps make it easy to remove the deflector and gain complete access for cleaning.

"The clamps allow the sight glass to be removed quickly and easily, without the need for any tools," AAE President Donald Rainville said.

The other upgrade, an on-line sample port, allows users to remove a material sample through an opening during actual production.

"To my knowledge, we are the only company currently offering a true production-sample port," Rainville said. "It allows the user to verify it for troubleshooting, quality control and calibration."

It also makes it fast and easy to calibrate the machines, especially small- and medium-sized models.

Both of the features are available on new MovaColor feeders and via retrofit kits. The Quick-Clean clamps are made in Virginia and are only available from AAE.

Maguire

Maguire's latest model in its MGF line of gravimetric feeders is the MGF-3-ST, the smallest in the series. It is configured with a 0.375-inch auger and stepper motor, and can be used for either injection or extrusion applications. For extrusion (continuous mode), the throughput ranges from 0.4 pound to 8 pounds per hour; for injection (cyclical mode) in which the screw runs roughly 35 percent of the time, the throughput ranges from 2 pounds to 8 pounds per hour.

"The feeder was developed in a response to a shift in the materials being used and smaller let-down [ratio] requirements," said Frank Kavanagh, Maguire's VP of sales. "This can vary due to the pigment and additive strength that is required in the final product. We're finding let-down ratios of less than 1 percent more common for some UV additives and for color-tinting applications."

The other two models in the series have larger augers — 0.5-inch for the MGF-4-ST and 1-inch for the MGF-8-ST.

"In the past, people would buy an additive and it was 30 percent to 40 percent the additive, and the rest was a resin-based carrier in the pellet," Kavanagh said.

"Today, some of those are 80 percent to 90 percent additive and much less carrier resin. So where you once were putting in 4 percent to 6 percent of that additive, now you only have to put in 1 or 2 percent because each individual pellet contains a much higher percentage of the additive."

The ability to do that is a boon for processors; it's both cheaper and more efficient because they don't need to pay for and process all that base resin. However, it adds to the challenge for equipment manufacturers.

"Due to the demand in the marketplace for these heavier, loaded materials, we've had to go down to a 3/8-inch auger," Kavanagh said. "And we're still being challenged on that, where people want to see if they can get even lower let downs, on very small shots. That's a whole separate challenge in itself, because although you can possibly dispense the required material, you are still going to have to homogenize it. 

"When dealing with these types of very small shots with low let downs, the small MicroBlender becomes the better solution. Adding 1 percent or less to a 400-gram batch is a much easier target than trying to add 1 percent or less to a 10-gram shot," he said.

Conair

The introduction of the gravimetric feeder, when combined with another innovation — the rotating metering tube, used in place of a standard auger when exceptional accuracy is required, such as dispensing additives or colorants that can cost $50 or more per pound — changed the face of feeding.

While there haven't been many transformative changes since those two, feeding equipment manufacturers haven't been resting on their laurels. They continue to find new ways to improve performance, reduce costs and increase productivity.

"Gravimetric metering and the rotating-tube dispensing concept still represent the state-of-the-art in feeding technology," said Alan Landers, Conair's product manager for blending and feeding. "Recent enhancements have been aimed at improving ease of use."

Current TrueFeed models can be sized to handle pellets or masterbatch, regrind, powders or other hard-to-handle materials; the smallest model handles 0.1 gram to 1.1 grams per second, while the largest handles 1.4 grams to 35 grams per second.

The most recent upgrade to the series, a new 8-inch color touch-screen control, is easier to use. It displays all operational performance items in a simple graphic format, in real time.

The information also is presented on a single screen, so users don't need to waste time navigating around the screen when they need to make changes to set points or review operational performance.

"The TrueFeed touch control can also be used to operate multiple feeders," Landers said. "An operator can view up to four units on one screen, make changes to set points and see which materials are currently filling and dosing."

In December 2016, a medical parts manufacturer bought 10 of the TrueFeed gravimetric feeders with the 8-inch screen. The decision was based primarily on the fact that they could be configured as part of the MedLine family of clean-room-ready auxiliaries.

Michael T. McCue, copy editor

[email protected]

For more information

Advanced Auxiliary Equipment Inc.,Mathews, Va., 804-725-1950,  www.dryers-loaders-blenders.com

Conair Group,Cranberry Township, Pa., 724-584-5500, www.conairgroup.com

Maguire Products Inc.,Aston, Pa., 610-459-4300, www.maguire.com