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contents APRIL 2022 VOLUME 81 • NUMBER 2

FROM THE ARCHIVES

The November 2001 issue of Canadian Plastics reported on an R&D project between General Motors, chemical maker Basell, and additive supplier Southern Clay Products to create the first commercial automotive exterior part made of nanocomposite-filled plastic. The part was a TPO-based step-assist for the 2002 GMC Safari, and was manufactured by mixing a smectite clay additive with the plastic resin. “The small particle sizes of the clay additive provide huge surface areas relative to additives such as talc, resulting in enhanced performance properties with only a fraction of the inorganic filler,” our story noted.

Number of the month:

175*

* Number of U.N. countries that endorsed the March 2 resolution of the U.N. Environment Assembly to limit global plastic waste. (See pg. 6)

cover story

10 CHILLERS: Very cool energy savings 4

Editor’s View: Death of a salesman

Ideas & Innovations: A new plant-derived composite with bone-hard toughness

News: • Nearly 180 countries commit to creating plastics pollution treaty • Uniloy purchases Amsler assets • Clearlake adds Intertape Polymer in major packaging deal • People and Supplier News

20 Technology Showcase 21 Advertising Index

Chillers have always been major energy users at plastics manufacturing plants, but it doesn’t have to be this way. Here’s how to get more energy-efficient process cooling.

features

13 RAW MATERIALS HANDLING: Have regrind, will travel

Most processors are incorporating regrind these days, which means they have to convey these dusty, imperfectly shaped materials from the pickup point all the way to the molding machine. Some tips and the latest technologies can make it a problem-free journey.

16 INDUSTRIAL SOFTWARE: A vision for zero defects

Want to analyze your root production problems and eliminate bad parts entirely? Fredericton, N.B.-based industrial consultant Eigen Innovations has a machine vision software platform that can help get you there.

18 AUTOMOTIVE: Exo-s is growing steady

This Quebec-based automotive parts molder is expanding its capabilities and moving into new product sectors.

22 Technical Tips: Six simple tricks to improve your injection molding

Visit us at www.canplastics.com April 2022 Canadian Plastics

editor’s view

Canadian Plastics magazine reports on and interprets developments in plastics markets and technologies worldwide for plastics processors, moldmakers and end-users based in Canada.

www.canplastics.com

Death of a salesman

usually use this editorial space to discuss a current industry trend, but this time I’m going to write about something both industry-related and also very personal. My father, Peter Stephen, passed away in Gravenhurst, Ontario on Feb. 18 at age 86. If you’re a veteran of our industry you might have met him at some point, or might recognize his name, as he spent more than 40 years in Canada’s plastics sector as a machinery salesman, business owner, industry advocate, and volunteer extraordinaire. He also had a connection with Canadian Plastics magazine, in that one of our former publishers, the late Art Painter, played a role in bringing my father into the industry. A mechanical engineer by training, my father originally worked as plant foreman for Anchor Cap & Closure Corp. in Toronto in the early 1960s, and was put in charge of buying the company’s first injection molding machines. The more he learned about injection molding, and plastics in general, the more he liked it. My father knew Art Painter socially, and asked Art if there was a future in plastics; Art said yes, so in 1965 my father quit Anchor Cap and took a pay cut to become an injection press salesman at Toronto’s Danson Corp. Ltd., at that time one of the premier plastics machinery sales firms in Canada. My father eventually worked his way up to become Danson’s vice president of sales, and on one occasion he sold seven 500-ton Farrel injection molding machines to Rubbermaid Canada – Danson’s biggest single order ever – and bought a new Cadillac with his commission; the car became known among his colleagues and competitors as the “Rubbermaid Caddy.” And when

4 Canadian Plastics April 2022

owner Barney Danson entered federal politics in 1972, my father was one of a core group of employees who bought the firm and kept it going. In 1990, my father started his own agency, Stephen Sales Group, which became the Canadian or Ontario sales representative for some of the leading brands in injection molding, extrusion, and auxiliary equipment. During his career, he won two sales awards from Cincinnati-Milacron, including Salesman of the Year in 1993; received two Canplast awards for industry volunteer work from the Canadian Plastics Industry Association; and served as the chairman of the Plast-Ex trade show in Toronto in 1995, 1998, and 2001, becoming the first person to fill that role for more than one consecutive edition. He was also the vice president of the Canadian Plastics Pioneers organization and only the third Canadian invited to join the Plastics Pioneers Association of America. Even after retiring to his cottage on Lake Muskoka in Gravenhurst in 2007, my father never stopped advocating for the industry; he was the first cottager in his area to install woodplastic composite decking – which was considered anathema by much of the Muskoka establishment – and eventually talked more than one of his neighbours into doing the same. He truly loved the plastics industry and made countless friends in it over the decades, a number of whom contacted me after his passing to say that he had inspired them and helped them in their own careers. As one of them put it, among his generation of machinery salespeople and buyers, “almost everyone has a Peter Stephen story to tell.” Rest in peace, Dad.

Reader Service Print and digital subscription inquiries or changes, please contact Serina Dingeldein, Audience Development Manager Tel: 416-510-5124 Fax: 416-510-6875 email: sdingeldein@annexbusinessmedia.com Mail: 111 Gordon Baker Rd., Suite 400 Toronto, ON M2H 3R1 Mark Stephen 416-510-5110 Fax: 416-442-2230 mstephen@canplastics.com ASSOCIATE PUBLISHER Catherine McDonald 289-921-6520 cmcdonald@annexbusinessmedia.com ASSOCIATE PUBLISHER Stephen Kranabetter C: 416-561-5362 W: 416-510-6791 skranabetter@annexbusinessmedia.com ACCOUNT COORDINATOR Cheryl Fisher 416-510-5194 cfisher@annexbusinessmedia.com GROUP PUBLISHER/VP SALES Martin Mcanulty mmcanulty@annexbusinessmedia.com COO Scott Jamieson sjamieson@annexbusinessmedia.com PRINTED IN CANADA ISSN 008-4778 (Print) ISSN 1923-3671 (Online) Publication Mail Agreement #40065710 2022 SUBSCRIPTION RATES 5 issues Canadian Plastics, plus Dec. 2022 Buyers’ Guide: CANADA: 1 Year $77.50 plus applicable taxes; 2 Years $123.50+ taxes USA: $176.00 (CAD) / year FOREIGN: $201.00 (CAD) / year

Occasionally, Canadian Plastics will mail information on behalf of industry related groups whose products and services we believe could be of interest to you. If you prefer not to receive this information, please contact our audience development department in any of the four ways listed above. Annex Privacy Officer privacy@annexbusinessmedia.com • Tel: 800-668-2374 No part of the editorial content of this publication can be reprinted without the publisher’s written permission ©2022 Annex Business Media. All rights reserved. Opinions expressed in this magazine are not necessarily those of the editor or the publisher. No liability is assumed for errors or omissions. All advertising is subject to the publisher’s approval. Such approval does not imply any endorsement of the products or services advertised. Publisher reserves the right to refuse advertising that does not meet the standards of the publication. MEMBER: Magazines Canada, Canadian Plastics Industry Association.

Mark Stephen, editor

mstephen@canplastics.com www.canplastics.com

ideas & innovations

A new plant-derived composite with bone-hard toughness

Photo Credit: Image courtesy of the researchers, edited by MIT News

new woody composite, engineered by a team at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in Cambridge, Mass., is as tough as bone and as hard as aluminum, and it could pave the way for naturally-derived plastics. The MIT team has engineered a composite made mostly from cellulose nanocrystals (CNCs) mixed with a bit of synthetic polymer. The organic crystals take up between 60 to 90 per cent of the material, which is the highest fraction of CNCs achieved in a composite to date. The team hit on a recipe for the CNCbased composite that they could fabricate using both 3D printing and conventional casting. They printed and cast the composite into penny-sized pieces of film that they then used to test the material’s strength and hardness. They also machined the composite into the shape of a tooth to show that it can be used to make cellulose-based dental implants – or any plastic products – that are stronger, tougher, and more sustainable. “By creating composites with CNCs at high loading, we can give polymerbased materials mechanical properties they never had before,” said team member John Hart. “And if we can replace some petroleum-based plastic with naturally-derived cellulose, that’s better for the planet as well.” The backstory to the project is that more than 10 billion tons of cellulose is synthesized from the bark, wood, or leaves of plants each year, most of which is used to manufacture paper and textiles, with most of the rest being processed into powder for use in food thickeners and cosmetics. In recent years, scientists have explored uses for CNCs, which can be extracted from cellulose fibres via acid hydrolysis. The exceptionally strong crystals could be used as natural reinforcements in polymer-based materials, but researchers have only been able to incorporate low fractions of CNCs, as the crystals have tended to clump together and only

A tooth made from the new composite printed by the MIT team.

weakly bond with polymer molecules. Hart and his colleagues looked to develop a composite with a high fraction of CNCs that they could shape into strong, durable forms. They started by mixing a solution of synthetic polymer with commercially available CNC powder. The team determined the ratio of CNC and polymer that would turn the solution into a gel, with a consistency that could either be fed through the nozzle of a 3D printer or poured into a mold to be cast. They used an ultrasonic probe to break up any clumps of cellulose in the gel, making it more likely for the dispersed cellulose to form strong bonds with the polymer molecules. They then fed some of the gel through a 3D printer and poured the rest into a mold to be cast, and then let the printed samples dry. In the process, the material shrank, leaving behind a solid composite composed mainly of CNCs. And when the team examined the composite’s structure under a microscope, they also found that grains of cellulose had settled into a brick-andmortar pattern, similar to the architec-

ture of nacre, also known as mother of pearl. In nacre, this zigzag microstructure stops a crack from running straight through the material, and the MIT researchers found that the same had happened with their new cellulose composite. They tested the material’s resistance to cracks, using tools to initiate both nanoscale and microscale cracks, and discovered that the composite’s arrangement of cellulose grains prevented the cracks from splitting the material – a resistance to plastic deformation that gives the composite a hardness and stiffness at the boundary between conventional plastics and metals. Going forward, the team is looking for ways to minimize the shrinkage of gels as they dry. While shrinkage isn’t much of a problem when printing small objects, anything bigger could buckle or crack as the composite dries. “If you could avoid shrinkage, you could keep scaling up, maybe to the meter scale,” Hart said. “Then if we were to dream big, we could replace a significant fraction of plastics with cellulose composites.” CPL April 2022 Canadian Plastics

news

Nearly 180 countries commit to creating plastics pollution treaty

plastic pollution.” It said it appreciated governments for “highlighting the significant role plastics play in society.” And the Ottawa-based Chemistry Industry Association of Canada (CIAC) also said it supports the treaty. “[We] recognize the need for global action to prevent leakage of plastic into the environment and achieve universal access to waste collection,” said CIAC president and CEO Bob Masterson. Environmental groups also said they saw a historic win in the UNEA decision, since negotiators will broadly consider the life cycle of plastics, including fossil fuel extraction and production, rather than focusing only on waste in the environment. CPL

Uniloy purchases Amsler assets

low molding machine builder Uniloy Inc. has entered the PET stretch blow molding (SBM) machine market with the purchase of some assets of defunct Vaughan, Ont.based blow molding equipment supplier Amsler Equipment Inc. The financial terms of the deal have not been disclosed. In a March 8 news release, officials with Tecumseh, Mich.-based Uniloy said the company will supply spare

6 Canadian Plastics April 2022

parts and service support for owners of Amsler equipment under the new Uniloy SBM product line; and that it has hired former Amsler CEO Bruce Coxhead, as well as other Amsler technical staff. Coxhead is now the general manager of the Uniloy SBM product line. Uniloy acquired assets that were abandoned by Amsler after it had been a tenant of the now-bankrupt Niigon Machines Ltd. Amsler had

relocated from Bolton, Ontario to a rented Niigon facility in Vaughan in 2021. Uniloy purchased the assets from the receiver and trustee in Niigon’s bankruptcy proceedings. Originally named W. Amsler Equipment Inc., Amsler was founded in 1994 by Werner Amsler, and built all-electric linear PET stretch blow molding equipment ranging from one to six cavities with outputs of 1,500 to 10,000 bottles per hour. CPL www.canplastics.com

Photo Credit: Adobe Stock/DimaBerlin

n a development that could have major repercussions on how plastics are regulated and used around the world, the United Nation’s top environmental body has agreed to move forward on a global plastics pollution treaty. Representatives from 175 U.N. countries endorsed the March 2 resolution of the U.N. Environment Assembly (UNEA) – the U.N.’s top environmental body – which establishes a committee charged with the goal of completing the draft of a global, legally binding agreement by the end of 2024. Countries will now spend two years negotiating details of the treaty, but diplomats involved in drafting the resolution said their decision marked a big step toward controlling plastics pollution and putting in place stronger laws to make plastics more circular. “This is an insurance policy for this generation and future ones, so they may live with plastic and not be doomed by it,” said Inger Andersen, executive director of the U.N. Environment Program (UNEP). “[We] need to bring the private sector into the room, because the private sector, after all, are the producers of plastics.” Andersen also said that UNEP “will work with any willing government and business across the value chain” to shift away from single-use plastics, as well as “to mobilise private finance and remove barriers to investments in research and in a new circular economy.” The treaty has drawn praise from some plastics groups. The International Council of Chemical Associations, which includes the American Chemistry Council, said in a statement that it was pleased with the outcome of the UNEA meeting and “fully supports a legally binding agreement on

news

ProAmpac buys Ontario flexible packaging maker Belle-Pak

n a deal that expands its presence in Canada, Cincinnati, Ohio-based flexible packaging company ProAmpac is buying Belle-Pak Packaging Inc., of Markham, Ontario, for an undisclosed amount. Belle-Pak makes poly mailers; security bags; packing list envelopes; and retail, medical, and clinical bags. The company was founded in 1991, and has more than 200 employees at a 180,000-square-foot location serving Canada, the U.S., and Mexico. Customers include financial institutions, armored car companies, retailers, law enforcement agencies, hospitals, and hotels. Brands using Belle-Pak packaging include Canada Post, Federal Express, United States Postal Service, 3M, United Parcel Service, and Purolator. “With Belle-Pak’s advanced technology and efficient manufacturing capabilities, our combined company will be wellpositioned for continued growth,” ProAmpac CEO Greg Tucker said in a Feb. 22 news release. The deal for Belle-Pak follows ProAmpac’s earlier acquisitions of Quebec-based firms Rosenbloom Groupe Inc., Hymopack Ltd., and Dyne-A-Pack in December 2020. ProAmpac now has about 50 locations around the globe, with more than 7,000 employees. CPL

Clearlake adds Intertape Polymer in major packaging deal

ntertape Polymer Group Inc., a global maker of plastic film and other packaging materials based in Montreal and Sarasota, Fla., has been bought by private equity firm Clearlake Capital Group LP for US$2.6 billion in cash. “We believe this transaction is a great next step in the evolution of our business, as Clearlake has strong industry knowledge in the protective packaging and e-commerce ecosystems,” Intertape president and CEO Greg Yull said in a March 8 news release. “[This] provides us the operational and financial resources to accelerate our acquisition strategy, as well as organic growth opportunities such as investing in product innovation, sustainability, and market expansion.” Intertape has about 4,100 employees with operations in 34 locations, including 22 manufacturing facilities in North America, five in Asia, and two in Europe. The company makes film-based pressure-sensitive and water-activated tapes, stretch and shrink films, protective packaging, woven and non-woven products, and packaging machinery for industrial and retail use. The transaction is expected to close in the third quarter of 2022. CPL

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CPL_Lorenz_April22.indd 1

THE CONVEYING PRODUCTS PEOPLE. April 2022 Canadian Plastics

2022-03-07 12:00 PM

news

ississauga, Ont.-based PVC decking and dock manufacturer Tiva Building Products has purchased a 50,000-square-foot production plant that sits on 36 acres in South Carolina, to expand into the U.S. for the first time and add capacity.

PEOPLE

John Roeleveld

Jamie Dinsmore

Leon Garoufalis

Al Dobbeck

Giovanni Spitale

Kyle Haley

Oliver Zintner

Amy McCully

Kasie Fairbarn

Chris Brooks

– Mississauga, Ont.-based chemicals distributor Andicor Specialty Chemicals Corp. has named John Roeleveld as president, and Jamie Dinsmore as vice president, sales and marketing. – Schaumburg, Ill.-based material distributor Composites One has named Leon Garoufalis as president and CEO, and Al Dobbeck as executive vice president and chief operating officer. – Pawcatuck, Conn.-based extrusion and converting equipment maker Davis-Standard LLC has named Giovanni Spitale as CEO; and Kyle Haley as aftermarket sales manager for Alberta, Manitoba and Saskatchewan, as well as the U.S. states of Idaho, Illinois, Iowa, Minnesota, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, North Dakota, South Dakota, Wisconsin, and Wyoming. – Germany-based thermoplastic elastomers maker Kraiburg TPE has named Oliver Zintner as CEO. – Niles, Ill.-based process cooling equipment maker Thermal Care Inc. has named Amy McCully as regional manager for the provinces of British Columbia, Alberta, and Saskatchewan, as well as the U.S. West Coast and Tijuana. – Extruder and printing equipment maker Windmoeller & Hoelscher Corp., headquartered in Lincoln, R.I., has named Kasie Fairbarn as product sales manager for blown film. – Grand Rapids, Mich.-based colour measurement equipment maker X-Rite Inc. has named Chris Brooks as president.

8 Canadian Plastics April 2022

In a Feb. 8 news release, Tiva officials said the company, which has been in the plastic extrusion industry for more than two decades, had been looking for a U.S. site for years. The exact location of the new plant hasn’t been disclosed, but the news release said it should be operational in the second half of 2022 following power supply upgrades and “multiple” extrusion line installations. “We have evaluated U.S. manufacturing facility sites for quite some time and knew even at the start of our business seven years ago that it was never a matter of if, but when,” CEO Terry Fangrad said. “The facility is perfect for significant capacity of production and inventory, while the site will accommodate multiple expansions as the Tiva brand continues to grow in North America.” The company produces Tivadek PVC boards, which are capped with acrylonitrile styrene acrylate (ASA) for heat resistance, colour retention, and weatherability; Tivadok cellular PVC boards with an ASA cap and a reinforced aluminum core; and Tivacoat, which is a zeroVOC, waterproof elastomeric membrane. Tivadeks come in 12 colours, and are finished and embossed on both sides, making the boards reversible. CPL

A rendering of the exterior of Tiva’s new U.S. decking manufacturing plant.

SUPPLIER NEWS – Worcester, Mass.-based Absolute Robot Inc. (ARI) has been authorized as a Fanuc robot system integrator. Fanuc’s line of six-axis and SCARA robots joins other products ARI offers, including three- and five-axis robots, end-ofarm tooling, conveyors, and guarding products. – Chemicals distributor Brenntag Specialties, which has Canadian headquarters in Toronto, has been named the exclusive distributor for BASF’s Baxxodur amine-based curing agents for Canada and the U.S.

www.canplastics.com

Image Credit: Tiva Building Products

Canada-based decking maker Tiva buys site for U.S. production

SNEAK PEEK Here’s an early look at what’s inside the upcoming June 2022 issue of Canadian Plastics magazine:

The cover story will be on tips for dryer maintenance. Hot, humid summer weather is coming, which means that dryers will be working overtime on both the regeneration and process. So this is the time to make sure that all of your dryer components are working perfectly.

Advertiser page 9

In addition, we’ll also feature articles on: J The latest technologies for size reduction J Cutting-edge extrusion applications J Additives for recycled plastics

Be sure to visit www.canplastics.com for daily news updates and longer feature articles, and follow us on Twitter, @CanPlastics

chillers

VERY COOL ENERGY SAVINGS

Chillers have always been major energy users at plastics manufacturing plants, but it doesn’t have to be this way. Here’s how to get more energy-efficient process cooling. By Mark Stephen, editor

paradox of plastics processing is that a molding shop can make 100 per cent defect-free parts across the board and still struggle financially if it doesn’t get a handle on its costs, beginning with energy usage. Which leads inevitably to process cooling and chillers. Chilling is a major energy user in a plastics plant, dramatically affecting energy consumption depending on the application and the type and size of the chiller. By some estimates, industrial chillers use a whopping 20 per cent of the total electrical power generated in North America. For decades, plastics processors had to select chillers based on their maximum cooling capacity requirements. And while this approach ensured plenty of chiller capacity, it wasn’t always energy-efficient, because typical chillers of the time were equipped with fixed-speed compressors – featuring fixed-speed motors and compressor scrolls – that operated at maximum speed and capacity regardless of the actual process cooling requirements. In industry lingo, they were oversized.

STEPS FORWARD

But it doesn’t have to be this way any longer. Beginning in the early 2000s, auxiliary equipment makers have implemented new compressor technology to provide more energy-efficient process chilling for less-than-full-load chiller

10 Canadian Plastics April 2022

capacity. The first advance involves digital-scroll compressors that enable chillers to unload cooling capacity – when chilling capacity isn’t needed, the scrolls are disengaged – thereby allowing the chillers to serve smaller loads and reduce power consumption. A second approach to variable chilling capacity is the adoption of chillers with variablespeed compressors; this capability, which is managed through advanced PLC controls, varies the speed of the motor to match the cooling load instead of running the motor at a fixed speed with modulated on/off cycles – as a digital-scroll compressor operates – and the result is a consistent and proportional energy savings throughout the chiller’s capacity range.

chillers are ideal when a piece of processing equipment needs a flow of cooling water at a significantly different temperature from other equipment,” said Jim Fisher, general manager, heat transfer with Conair Group. “As a rule, portable chillers operate with the most energy efficiency when the cooling load closely matches – to 80 per cent or more – the chiller’s rated capacity.” Central chillers are generally larger in capacity, more complex in design, higher in energy efficiency, and higher in installed cost, Fisher continued. “The key advantage of a central chiller system is that it can handle multiple, large, and variable process loads that require cooling water of roughly the same temperature,” he said.

Depending on a plant’s location and the coolant temperatures to be maintained, free cooling offers one of the biggest energy-saving opportunities for chilling water.

WHAT’S NEW, NOW

Processors on the market for chillers have the option of either portable or central systems, and while this choice usually isn’t decided by concerns about energy usage alone, each system has a distinctive energy footprint. “Portable

So, where does the industry go from there? The latest energy-efficient chilling technologies from some of the suppliers are another collective step forward. ACS Group’s High Efficiency (HE) central chillers can save processors as much as 60 per cent in energy costs compared with traditional chillers, company officials said. The units have smart controls that offer fast system diagnostics, including live graphing and data logging, as well as the ability to monitor as many as 10 HE chillers by way of a smartphone, tablet, or PC. The computations enable HE chillers to conwww.canplastics.com

chillers

Conair Group’s new ECO line of chillers can be installed outdoors to provide chilled water indoors for plastics processing machines.

vides cooling capacities from 38 to 130 tons, and each unit’s screw compressor features variable-capacity modulation. An optional inverter drive offers continuous modulation from 25 per cent to 100 per cent, Frigel officials said, automatically adjusting to cooling load demand and saving energy under variable load conditions for a superior EER. Thermal Care Inc.’s Accuchiller NQV series chillers with variable-speed compressors are an energy-saving option for processes where the heat load regularly varies. “NQV chillers use a PLC to constantly monitor the heat load and adjust the compressor speed for peak efficiency and temperature control,” said Chris Garich, the company’s product manager. “The chillers work only as hard as necessary, and offer energy savings of up to 50 per cent compared to conventional chillers.” Wittmann Battenfeld’s new Tempro plus D L120 temperature controller has a frequency-controlled pump called “SpeedDrive” that lets users set the correct parameters for motor speed, flow rate, pump pressure, and differential temperature. “The SpeedDrive pump is a synonym for energy-efficient pump operation, since it’s generally sufficient to operate the pump under partial load to comply with the selected parameter settings,” Wittmann officials said. On the control side, next-generation control systems provide premium performance data by utilizing extensive flow, temperature, pressures, and running diagnostics of a system. “Cloudbased storage of this data can be pulled into any data table, allowing the end user to summarize what they want to see in daily operations,” said Chris Garich. “Reports on maintenance, energy usage,

Photo Credit: Conair Group

tinuously monitor conditions and adjust to run in the most energy-efficient way. HE chillers also feature fans that use EC brushless motors, which are more energy-efficient than units with variable-frequency drive (VFD) compressors, regardless of the load. Advantage Engineering Inc. recently introduced its upgraded MG series control system for its Maximum portable air- and water-cooled chillers. With a digital-scroll compressor, the upgraded system provides better temperature control, Advantage Engineering president Jon Gunderson said, and has more user features and a better user interface via an LCD that provides more information about performance and energy usage for easier and quicker diagnostics, and better control. Aquatech, a division of Piovan Group, introduced its Easycool+ line of chillers a few years ago, which were created specifically for the plastics industry, and which feature components and functions that provide energy savings compared with conventional “fixed” central chiller systems. The chillers have a favorable energy efficiency ratio (EER) – which indicates how many kilowatts (kW) of electricity are required to produce a kW of cooling capacity – due to their ability to adjust cooling capacity, pressure, temperature, and more. Easycool+ chillers also have a unique configuration of two Copeland multi-scroll compressors of different sizes, Aquatech officials said, which allows the units to tailor the compressor operation to the cooling demand. Conair’s new ECO line of chillers can operate in conditions from -28° to -87°C, or -18° to -125°F, which allows them to be installed outdoors to provide chilled water indoors for plastics processing machines. “All the models feature direct-drive hermetically sealed scroll compressors,” said Jim Fisher. “Other energy-saving features include instantaneous, continuous calculations performed to deliver increased efficiency under partial load, with automatic refrigeration pressure control.” The 3FR air-cooled chiller from Frigel North America Inc. is tailored to the needs of plastics processors and pro-

and machine status are just the basics of what they can do.” For example, Garich continued, Thermal Care’s optional Industry 4.0-inspired Connex4.0 system allows for integrated connectivity and secure remote access to all related connected equipment from any device that has internet access.

FREE IS GOOD

While much of this technology is either brand new or relatively new, molders can also reduce their process cooling costs by getting creative through a few older tricks. One of the biggest energy-saving opportunities is free cooling, which uses ambient air that’s colder than the supply chilled water setpoint to perform cooling rather than the refrigeration cycle of the chiller. In a country with Canada’s climate, you’d think free cooling would be a no-brainer, but you’d be at least partially wrong. “Free cooling can be very effective, but it’s often overlooked,” said Jon Gunderson. “In a region such as Toronto, for example, free cooling can replace mechanical refrigeration for 50 per cent of the year and consumes about 75 per cent less energy.” A free cooling system usually consists of a fluid cooler and glycol circulating system and a heat exchanger to isolate the glycol from the process water, Gunderson continued. “Controls automatically engage the winter cooling system when outdoor temperatures permit its use,” he said. “Not only does the system save energy, but since your chiller isn’t running for half of the year, it requires less maintenance and should last longer.” The caveat to free cooling is that – as with real estate – it’s all about the location. “Depending on where their plant is located and the coolant temperatures to April 2022 Canadian Plastics

Photo Credit: Wittmann Battenfeld

chillers

Wittmann Battenfeld’s new Tempro plus D L120 temperature controller, with energy-efficient pump operation.

be maintained, some processors decide that free cooling isn’t worth it, especially since free cooling circuitry adds to the system capital expenditure,” Jim Fisher said. “I usually recommend it, however, since there’s almost always some amount of payback through energy savings over the life of the chiller.” Another basic energy-saving strategy is to use chilling water more effectively. Most processing facilities have a cooling tower to provide cooling to hydraulics, chiller condensers, and other process equipment; and this tower has a fan and evaporates water to produce process water. But there are downsides. While effective at providing cooling, evaporative cooling towers consume a lot of water, require water treatment to control biological growth, and require constant filtering. An alternative is a fluid cooler, which uses ambient air to cool the process water, but this approach is limited by the temperature of the ambient air – in most cases, the experts say, the practical limit is a process water temperature leaving the dry fluid cooler about -12°C or 10°F warmer than the entering air temperature. To expand the usefulness of fluid coolers as a replacement for evaporative cooling towers, manufacturers have added evaporative pads to their fluid coolers to pre-cool the warm summertime air through a process called adiabatic cooling. “Adiabatic cooling occurs by evaporating water into the dry air entering the fluid cooler,” Chris Garich said. “The air is cooled as it absorbs the water, and provides a consistent and stable output leaving water temperature of 30°C or 85°F to process.

12 Canadian Plastics April 2022

Although this technology uses some water, the system is extremely waterefficient and is only needed during peak summertime conditions.” The result is as much as a 90 per cent reduction in water use versus a conventional evaporative cooling tower, Garich continued. “In addition, the water is fully evaporated and not recirculated – unlike with a conventional cooling tower – so there’s no need for water treatment,” he said. Also, the experts say, processors should avoid wasting energy and time by over-cooling a part. In the case of chillers, for example, an increase of chiller process temperature of -17°C or 1°F will save approximately 1.5 per cent on chiller energy usage. Lowering the process supply temperature will require more energy and isn’t as efficient.

AN OUNCE OF PREVENTION

Finally, being proactive with chiller maintenance, especially in the early winter, can lead to better results in the spring when – for those that use free cooling – it’s time to start the systems up again. Performing chiller maintenance as early as possible in the winter gives facility managers the benefit of finding major damage with plenty of time to fix any problems before the unit needs to be back in operation. “For air-cooled chillers, make sure there’s a clean path of airflow going across the condensing coil by washing the coil regularly,” said Jim Fisher. “And also keep condenser filters clean to reduce pressure drop.” In addition, regular monitoring can identify when chiller tube cleaning should take place, the experts say, and is recom-

mended at least once every year; refrigerant levels should be checked to stay within the manufacturer’s recommended levels; and water treatment helps prevent the buildup of contaminants on heattransfer surfaces that can lead to loss of efficiency and to the growth of harmful bacteria. And if your facility has a cooling tower, it should be included in your chiller maintenance plan. In the end, having the right equipment and the appropriate operating and maintenance methodology can put a plastics manufacturing plant on the path towards reducing its chiller energy conCPL sumption. RESOURCE LIST ACS Group (New Berlin, Wis.); www.acscorporate.com; 262-641-8600 Auxiplast Inc. (Sainte-Julie, Que.); www.auxiplast.com; 450-922-0282 Equiplas (Toronto); 416-407-5456 Shaw & Christler Equipment Technologies (Vancouver, Wash.); www.shawequiptech.com; 800-528-8011 Advantage Engineering Inc. (Greenwood, Ind.); www.advantageengineering.com; 317-887-0729 Chillers Inc. (Newmarket, Ont.); www.chillersinc.com; 905-895-9667 Conair Group (Cranberry Township, Pa.); www.conairgroup.com; 724-584-5500 Dier International Plastics Inc. (Unionville, Ont.); www.dierinternational.com; 416-219-0509 Industries Laferriere (Mascouche, Que.); www.industrieslaferriere.ca; 450-477-8880 Turner Group Inc. (Seattle, Wash.); www.turnergroup.net; 206-769-3707 Frigel North America (East Dundee, Ill.); www.frigel.com; 847-540-0160 Hamilton Plastic Systems Ltd. (Mississauga, Ont.); www.hamiltonplasticsystems.com; 905-890-0055 Piovan Canada Ltd. (Mississauga, Ont.); www.piovan.com; 905-629-8822 Thermal Care Inc. (Niles, Ill.); www.thermalcare.com; 847-966-2260 D Cube (Montreal); www.dcube.ca; 514-272-0500 Tantus Corp. (Pickering, Ont.); www.tantuscorp.com; 647-258-9657 Wittmann Battenfeld Canada Inc. (Richmond Hill, Ont.); www.wittmann-group.com; 905-887-5355 www.canplastics.com

raw materials handling

HAVE REGRIND, WILL TRAVEL Most processors are using regrind these days, which means they have to convey these dusty, imperfectly shaped materials from the pickup point all the way to the molding machine. Some tips and the latest technologies can make it a problem-free journey. By Mark Stephen, editor

f you think about it, we’re at a unique moment in plastics processing, where several separate drivers are converging: unpredictable material prices, routine supply chain challenges, and the consumer-driven push for greener products. It’s a mashup that makes regrind almost requisite for many projects these days, which means that processors have to convey this material from a storage area to where they mold or extrude it. And there’s a potential world of trouble between the pickup point and the discharge end, which is why equipment selection and system design and operation are of critical importance. The following are some tips and new technologies that can help.

Photo Credit: Adobe Stock/albertobrian

PROFILE PROBLEMS

The first thing to realize is that, compared to standard resin pellets, some regrind presents a special conveying challenge. For one thing, since it has undergone at least one processing method such as molding or extrusion, the subsequent sprues, runners, flash, and rejected parts have been ground or chopped into chips or flakes, and can be uneven. Which causes problems in some cases. “Regrind tends to have an irregular shape, especially sheet regrind, which is flat,” said Brian Davis, general manager of Maguire Products Canada. “For anything to be conveyed it has to have a profile, and sheet regrind doesn’t have one, which makes conveying difficult.” But despite

some unevenness, the profiles of other types of regrind are usually good enough for adequate conveying. “Sprue and runner regrind will typically flow similarly to regular pellets, so usually they won’t cause any conveying problems,” said Steve Hamilton, CEO of Hamilton Plastic Systems Ltd. Dilute phase conveying – which suspends pellets in high-velocity air to convey them to vacuum receivers on processing machines – is the most common choice for conveying regrind. The good news is that, since dilute phase is the default mode for resin conveying at most operations anyway – because it can easily adapt to materials with a wide range of flow characteristics, such as particle size and bulk density – processors already have it and have considerable experience with how it works. Dilute phase conveying is also the most economical mode in many cases because the equipment used in these systems is typically easier to clean and maintain, and this is another factor to weigh in conveying regrind: it can be very dusty. And when scrap is likely to be recycled in-house, the issue of dust can be especially frustrating, since the process of granulating material and then conveying it to storage or back to a molding machine or extruder affords opportunities for even more dust creation, and then for it to escape into the plant environment. If it’s not removed, dust and other lightweight fractions can cause cosmetic problems in molded or extruded products, including haziness,

gels, and black spots, as well as mechanical flaws and housekeeping problems. The good news is, this is a problem that conveying system makers are on top of. For example, Conair Group recently simplified operation of its DeDuster C-50 separator, eliminating wear-prone moving parts and improving the processing of regrind – it now commonly achieves residual dust content of fewer than 50 parts per million for fines smaller than 500 microns and 100 per cent streamer removal. And Pelletron Corp.’s HR45 DeDuster, which will ultimately replace the earlier XP45 DeDuster, offers reduced operating costs with 40 per cent less power consumption, company officials said, as well as reduced equipment costs thanks to smaller filters and cyclones. Dusty regrind may also require added steps in filtration. “Every loader or receiver has filtration, and typically with virgin material we install a screen mesh filter that allows dust and fines to be removed from the process and taken back to the central filter,” said Brian Davis. “But with dusty regrind, some of that dust may be small enough to get through the filtration system and into the pump.” In that case, Davis continued, each receiver should have a proper cloth filter that provides blowback so that the filter is blown clear after every cycle, creating a clean path of air and an efficient system. “Or if the processor is using polystyrene regrind, which has a tendency to shatter, we’ve installed powder loaders, which are April 2022 Canadian Plastics

raw materials handling

built with filtration in mind,” Davis added. Novatec Inc.’s CDC series cyclone plastics dust collector is designed to protect the vacuum pump and reduce filter maintenance by collecting up to 99 per cent of dust and fines before they reach the pump; and its FDC series dust collector is said to provide a higher level of vacuum pump protection than standard cyclone dust collectors – three polytetrafluoroethylene-coated cartridge filters are 99 per cent efficient to one micron, Novatec officials said, and remove more fines than standard cartridge filters to minimize clogging of vacuum pump filters. Another point to keep in mind is that if regrind – or any material, for that matter – is conveyed using a conventional blower system, the impact of impeller blades could create additional fines. Consequently, the experts say, it’s always better to move material using a vacuum or negative-pressure system – in which the material never touches the impeller – with an oversized blower and large-diameter conveying lines. The perennial problem of dusty regrind makes regular line purging – where air is pulled through the pipe at the end of the conveying cycle as a preventative measure against blockages – that much more important. In order to purge a material line, the installation of a purging valve or a controlled suction box is necessary. “Purging is particularly important when processing regrind, especially at the most critical points in the material lines such as bends before a long vertical riser, where the material can accumulate and clog the tube after falling downwards when the vacuum valve is closed at the

14 Canadian Plastics January/February 2021

receiver,” said Jan Rickenbach, applications manager and regional sales manager with Motan Inc. “We always recommend purging the lines, and we quote that capability on all of our conveying systems and install it right away, especially when we know the system will be handling regrind.”

DOWN THE TUBES

Dust and fines aside, regrind may or may not be more difficult to convey than virgin material depending on other physical characteristics; and this could affect the dimensions and other aspects of the conveying line. For example, the diameter of the conveying tubing is normally determined by the rate and distance, but in the case of regrind with square particles, large particles, irregular shapes, or soft materials, the tube size may need to be larger to prevent clogging. “And everything else in the material path might have to be reinforced as well, such as the manifold table,” Rickenbach said. “And on the receiver, we can install a material inlet flap with a large thick glass plate that the material hits, absorbing the kinetic energy and reducing the wear on the receiver.” Particular care should be taken with sheet regrind and flex hoses, which can be a bad combination. “Sheet regrind has a flat profile, which almost makes it similar to conveying razor blades, and it can cut flex hoses very easily,” said Brian Davis. “In these cases, we recommend a stainless steel flex hose.” Conveying speeds are another of the nuances of moving regrind. “The bulk density of regrind is inherently less than that of virgin pellets although the particle sizes may be the same or big-

ger,” said Steve Hamilton. “Therefore, regrind pellets won’t slip through the air stream quite as well as virgin pellets, which means they have higher natural velocities.” Keeping that caveat in mind, the same general rules apply for conveying regrind as for conveying virgin materials: For highly abrasive glass- and mineral-filled regrind, the slowest conveying speeds are the best, the experts say, while the mid-range wave-conveying speeds of 1,200 to 2,000 feet per minute are good for PET and acrylic regrinds, which are only mildly abrasive. One notable conveying challenge involves regrind flakes. Since they don’t flow freely and have differing sizes and thicknesses, flakes can slip between the rotor and the housing in the rotary valves, locking the valve. To solve the problem, Pelletron developed a special rotary valve, the GRM-RG, which stands for granular rotary valve medium-pressure regrind. “The valve has a combination of features that prevents locking of the valve,” said Pelletron president and CEO Heinz Schneider. “The anti-shearing device [works] in combination with V-shape rotors.”

UNFORCED ERRORS

When asked to name some of the most common mistakes that processors make when conveying regrind, some system suppliers zero in on the pickup points for injection molders. “Depending on the shape of the regrind and how it’s cut, it can interlock in the storage container, which makes it difficult to get it out,” said Brian Davis. “In these situations, we can let more or less air in at the pickup point to increase or decrease the amount of material; or use a smaller pickup point, which increases the pickup velocity.” For extrusion, meanwhile – and especially in recycling – other suppliers say that processors simply aren’t investing in the proper equipment. “They’re using the wrong vacuum loaders, pumps, and filters, and then they run into problems conveying it,” said Jan Rickenbach. Finally, processors that store regrind for any length of time are basically asking for conveying problems. “Storing regrind is a productivity killer,” said Steve Ham-

Photo Credit: Maguire Products

Maguire Products’ LowPro vacuum loading system for conveying regrind and pellets from storage to single or multiple blenders.

raw materials handling

ilton. “Not only is it expensive, but it leads to contamination and to settling; over time, the regrind almost turns into a solid block of material, which obviously doesn’t convey well. That’s why we always recommend that processors incorporate regrind back into the mix as quickly as possible.” The problems that can arise when conveying some regrind should be easier to fix, however, as more product offerings come out that are tailored for more efficient regrind conveying – beginning with controls. The FlexTouch FTS control series from Novatec is said to provide complete control in a fixed I/O package for evacuating regrind and conveying it to collection stations. “All grinder evacuation stations, recycle collection stations, pumps, and optional material line valves connect to a single enclosure via discrete wiring,” company officials said. And Wittmann Battenfeld’s M8-IPC network control for central material handling systems is an upgrade to the company’s previous M7-IPC system, and the CAN-bus-based control has a number of new features, including radiofrequency identification (RFID) technology, so that regrind from different granulators can be transported unmixed to separate containers and is only transported if the material line is correctly connected to the granulator and to the matching container, to prevent accidentally mixing different regrind types. And on the hardware side, Hamilton Plastic Systems’ self-powered integral motor loaders, which include the Vectra and Ratio models, are designed for conveying regrind and other pellets directly to processing machines, with conveying ability ranges from a few hundred to over 2,000 pounds per hour (PPH); the integrated Ratio models include

two inlet ports with controls for ratio loading from multiple sources. Maguire’s LowPro vacuum loading system, meanwhile, is designed for conveying regrind and other pellets from storage to one or multiple blenders, and has a discharge flap three to six times wider than the flap on traditional upright receivers, making possible a dump time of only a second or two per cycle, depending on material flow properties. And recommended for beside-the-press conveying of regrind material, the LS-4 GT series self-contained glass tube loader from Universal Dynamics Inc., a Piovan Group company, has a maximum throughput of 100 PPH, while the LS-8 GT series has a maximum throughput of 400 PPH. Each comes complete with a vacuum blower/motor assembly mounted on the vacuum lid, flexible hose with clamps, sweep elbow, suction lance, and a Pyrex glass tube feed hopper with level switch. UnaDyn officials say the LS-4 and LS-8 loaders are both low-maintenance and self-cleaning, and the filters are cleaned with blowback of compressed air after each loading cycle. In the end, regrind can sometimes present special conveying challenges compared to virgin resin. But if you use the right technologies and perhaps a few specialized tricks – and consult your auxiliary equipment supplier when in doubt – you can move it from the pickup point to the molding machine without missing a beat. CPL

TURN TO THE

INDUSTRY EXPERTS NOZZLES, TIPS & ACCESSORIES

RESOURCE LIST Conair Group (Cranberry Township, Pa.); www.conairgroup.com; 724-584-5500 Dier International Plastics Inc. (Unionville, Ont.); www.dierinternational.com; 416-219-0509 Industries Laferriere (Mascouche, Que.); www.industrieslaferriere.ca; 450-477-8880 Turner Group Inc. (Seattle, Wash.); www.turnergroup.net; 206-769-3707 Hamilton Plastic Systems Ltd. (Mississauga, Ont.); www.hamiltonplasticsystems.com; 905-890-0055 Maguire Products Canada Inc./Novatec Inc. (Concord, Ont.); www.maguire.com; 905-879-1100 Motan Inc. (Plainwell, Mich.); www.motan-colortronic.com; 269-685-1050 D Cube (Montreal); www.dcube.ca; 514-272-0500

THE BEST QUALITY. FINEST WORKMANSHIP.

Pelletron Corp., (Lancaster, Pa.); www.pelletroncorp.com; 717-293-4008 Universal Dynamics Inc./Piovan Canada Ltd. (Mississauga, Ont.); www.piovan.com; 905-629-8822 Wittmann Battenfeld Canada Inc. (Richmond Hill, Ont.); www.wittmann-group.com; 905-887-5355

ORDER

TODAY! April 2022 Canadian Plastics

CPL_PCS Company_Feb22_CSA.indd 1

2022-02-03 7:20 AM

industrial software

hen it comes to part quality testing in manufacturing, the jury is still out on whether destructive or nondestructive testing is the better method. But what if a production process could adjust its process controls in real-time, and continually improve, to prevent any quality issues in the first place? The quest for zero defects is the ultimate goal of any parts manufacturer, and a Fredericton, N.B.-based industrial software platform developer wants to help as many of them as possible move a step closer. Eigen Innovations Inc. was founded in 2012 by a team of machine learning, mechanical, and software engineers trained at the University of New Brunswick (UNB) in Fredericton and Saint John, and the 20-employee-strong firm is now making its mark as a supplier of a platform that unites machine vision with process and quality data, primarily for automotive part suppliers. According to James Finch, Eigen’s director of customer success, the firm’s artificial intelligence (AI) machine vision platform has been purpose-built and optimized to analyze factory image and process data as it’s captured, creating a traceable digital profile for every factory part and component in order to analyze root problems and eliminate defects altogether. “Our hybrid cloud and edge software suite is designed specifically to address complex challenges facing high-volume

16 Canadian Plastics April 2022

By Mark Stephen, editor

part manufacturers, in particular challenges relating to plastic welding and complex surface vision,” Finch said. “It features proprietary image processing and data extraction techniques that transform vision systems from standalone inspection tools to an enterpriselevel, process intelligence platform that can make changes on the fly, shut the machine off in less than a second if it detects a bad part being made, and provide insights on how to prevent that defect from happening again. The goal is to give manufacturers the ability to see inside their products and processes and use that knowledge to overcome some of their biggest production challenges.”

MAKING A DIGITAL RECORD

Typically, an Eigen factory configuration includes camera sensors to capture a critical view of parts in process; an Eigen smart module that collects data from those sensors and from PLCs and deploys machine learning models; an HMI monitor and label on the factory floor; an online cloud platform to monitor, analyze, and collaborate in-factory or remotely; and a PLC integration to automate actions when process or quality issues are detected. “Our platform gives the customer’s operators and engineers real-time information, so they can quickly adjust process controls to prevent quality issues inline,” Finch said. “They also have access to advanced data

analysis tools, so they can quickly access, search, and compare parts to conduct root-cause analysis and investigations.” When deployed on multiple machines in multiple factories, Finch continued, the platform drives enterprise-level process control and improvements that reduce costs associated with poor quality. “The digital record we can produce lets us create a consistent blueprint to measure from, even if the camera angles aren’t perfect, and we’re able to take raw digital images and overlap them on the digital blueprint of a part to make sure that part is meeting its quality standards,” he said. In one recent case study, Finch said, a plastic fuel tank manufacturer had been using traditional quality monitoring and destruction testing to satisfy quality standards on a critical welding process, but wanted an upgrade. “We installed a thermal camera machine learning solution that monitors critical parts along the weld leg and prevents parts with inadequate welds from moving beyond the weld cell, massively reducing the risk of defective parts leaving the factory,” Finch said. And among its other customers, Finch said, Eigen has decreased the reject rates at one shop from eight per cent to less than one per cent, and saved another hundreds of thousands of dollars by eliminating destructive testing on a critical plastic part. www.canplastics.com

Photo Credit: Adobe Stock/Golf_MHNK

A VISION FOR ZERO DEFECTS

industrial software

Photo Credit: Eigen Innovations Inc.

THE ROAD AHEAD

Despite its successes, Eigen hasn’t forgotten its roots: The firm continues to recruit staff from UNB and maintains a manufacturing line in a laboratory on campus to test its solutions. And Eigen also knows where it wants to go in the future. “For 2022, we want to unlock scalability by partnering with a machine builder that can sell our solutions built into its own machines, and we’re also looking for deeper partnerships with our own customers,” Finch said. “And while most of our solutions currently involve high-volume welding applications for large enterprise clients in the auto sector in Canada and the U.S., in the longer term we’re looking at expanding our partnerships into South America and Europe and integrating our solutions onto any high-volume manufacturing process in any sector.” In a market that’s now flooded with defect detection providers, Finch says

Screenshot of an Eigen cloud platform, with real-time insights to process quality performance and key drivers for quick root cause analysis.

there are good reasons why Eigen stands out. “Our differentiators are that we not only detect part defects, we can prevent them from happening in the first place with the process adjust-

ments that we provide,” he said. “Zerodefect manufacturing is the place that all parts makers want to get to, and we want to make it a reality for them today.” CPL

April 2022 Canadian Plastics CPL_Struktol_April22.indd 1

2022-03-02 3:28 PM

automotive

EXO-S IS GROWING STEADY This Quebec-based automotive parts molder is expanding its capabilities and moving into new product sectors.

he pandemic has cast the short- and long-term business plans of countless manufacturers to the winds like so many straws over the past two years, but some companies have managed to weather the storm and remain on target to reach their goals. Exo-s is a case in point. Ever since venture capital firm Desjardins Capital of Montreal became the majority shareholder of Exo-s in 2012, the Sherbrooke, Que.based plastic part designer and processor has been expanding carefully – and that includes during the global health crisis, when the company acquired injection molder Plastiques Moore, which is also headquartered in Quebec, in February of this year. And more purchases may be in the offing.

AUTOMOTIVE, AND THEN SOME

Exo-s’ origins date back to 1968, when transportation products conglomerate Bombardier Inc. of Montreal set up an injection molding operation in Richmond, Quebec. In 1982 it combined some plastics and other operations to form Camoplast, which opened a blow molding plant in Kingsbury, Quebec in 1992. Camoplast expanded to blow molding in Michigan with the acquisition of Crocker Ltd. In 2010, Camoplast bought Solideal, and the combined business spun off under the new name

18 Canadian Plastics April 2022

of Exo-s two years later as an injection and blow molder. Today, Exo-s designs, engineers, and molds parts primarily for the automotive sector, including heating, venting, and air conditioning ducts; coolant reservoirs; engine covers; and other related products. The company has a total of 1,000 employees, and operates molding plants in Richmond; Coldwater, Mich.; Howe, Ind.; and San Juan Del Rio, Mexico. Tooling plants also are located in Howe and San Juan Del Rio.

Exo-s bought Canadian medical parts molder Plastiques Moore in February, and has other companies on its acquisition list. “The automotive sector has always been our main market – we received a General Motors Supplier of the Year award in 2012 – and we supply the major automotive OEMs, but we’re also looking to get into new spaces as well, in particular the medical market, which we believe we can be successful in,” said Exo-s president and CEO Emmanuel Duchesne. “The Plastiques Moore acquisition helps us with that.” Plas-

tiques Moore designs, molds, and assembles high-precision small and medium-sized injection molded parts, and has three ISO-8 cleanrooms used for medical sector manufacturing. And it also makes parts for industrial, mining, military, and household appliance markets, which means Exo-s can now expand its footprint into those areas as well. Plastiques Moore has three buildings in Saint-Damien-de-Buckland, Quebec; a sales office in Windsor, Ontario; and a production site in Monterrey, Mexico via partnership; in total, it operates out of a combined 80,000 square feet and employs more than 110 workers in Canada. “Our purchase of Plastiques Moore was the result of an extensive search,” Duchesne said. “They’ve been on our target list for the past few years, and when we reached out to them the timing was good – we were ready and they were ready. They’re already a key player in the medical market; and they also have a footprint in the auto sector, so this extends our automotive footprint as well.” Desjardins Capital financed the purchase in its entirety, Duchesne noted.

PUSHING THE ENVELOPE

The Plastiques Moore purchase aside, Exo-s is also seeking to grow in other www.canplastics.com

All photos courtesy of Exo-s

By Mark Stephen, editor

automotive

ways by focusing on electric vehicles (EVs), additive manufacturing, and automation. “EVs are arriving in greater numbers, and we’ve been working with some EV startups over the past few years on part development and production,” Duchesne said. “These companies have cutting-edge ideas, but they don’t have the real-world design and manufacturing experience that established automakers do, so we’re assisting in getting their concepts into workable part designs, which some were struggling with. We’ve done the same in the past with some of our smaller traditional auto part supplying customers that also didn’t have hands-on part design experience, so it’s a service that we’re very comfortable providing.” Additive manufacturing is opening other markets for the company. “Additive manufacturing is among the cornerstones of our innovation strategy, and we’re trying to be a leader by manufacturing actual production parts, not just prototypes,” Duchesne said. “This market is evolving rapidly and we recently acquired an HP MJF 3D printer that lets us make a higher volume of functional parts, as well as prototype parts. We have a staff of very smart young people who’re very eager to learn more about 3D printing, and

Above and left: On the Exo-s shop floor in Richmond, Quebec.

this helps keep them interested in their work as well as pushing new boundaries for us by replacing some of the traditional molding work we do with printed parts for customers.” Finally, Exo-s is developing solutions to improve its own in-house parts inspection. “We’re working with a Quebec university to develop our own proprietary automation system that’s guided by machine vision and artificial intelligence,” Duchesne said. “Our goal is to achieve zero-defect manufacturing.”

LOOKING FORWARD

Exo-s is unique in that it’s a 10-year-old company with employees that have been with it for over 50 years. “Some of our staff have been with us since the Camoplast days, which shows their loyalty to our company, to what we do, and to our values,” Duchesne said. “We try to pay

them back by creating an enjoyable atmosphere at our plants – we call it the ‘fun factor’ – and by bringing them into decision-making processes as much as possible. For example, we formed a committee with our employees in the early days of the pandemic and got their input on what working conditions they were comfortable with, and we’ve implemented them; as a result, we never suspended any of our projects over the past two years.” And as the pandemic winds down, Exo-s is gearing up for what its owners and executives see as the company’s next phase. “The Plastiques Moore purchase is the start of a new period of expansion for us,” Duchesne said. “We have other companies on our acquisition list that we plan to approach, and investors who are supportive and eager for us to grow.” CPL April 2022 Canadian Plastics

technology showcase

AUXILIARY EQUIPMENT

EXTRUSION

Expanded line of continuous gravimetric feeders

Edge encapsulation boosts PLA coating speed

Coperion K-Tron has expanded its original ProRate line with its new ProRate Plus line of continuous gravimetric feeders, which is designed to meet plastics industry demand for robust units for simple feeding applications. ProRate Plus feeders come in three models – the Plus-S, Plus-M, and PlusL – for a range of throughput needs. Up to six can be clustered at a single process inlet (pictured) with a footprint of only 75 square feet. All ProRate Plus feeders come with P-SFT load cells, and two different models of the Pro-Rate Plus PCM control module are available. The feeders’ ProClean rail system lets users retract the base unit and rotate it, which allows for cleaning and maintenance of the feeding section and screw element while the feeder is in position; and magnetic mounting of the bellows and screw provides the necessary holding force, while also making tool-free disassembly easy. Coperion K-Tron Salina Inc. (Salina, Kan.): www.coperion.com; 785-825-1611

INJECTION MOLDING Durable, precise, cost-effective units

The BT series machines from Borche North America are designed to be durable, precise, and cost-effective, and with energy-saving features that can decrease power consumption by up to 80 per cent compared to conventional machines. The units come with Keba controllers; a swivel unit for easy access to the barrel and screw; energy-efficient Japanese piston pump combined with low power consumption holding and cooling settings; linear guiderails, built-in carriage cylinder, and integral castings that ensure proper nozzle alignment; a large part drop-out area that allows for easy part removal and use of conveyors; and an SPI pattern ejection that allows for easy access to the ejector area. Additionally, auto grease lubrication is standard on all machines. Borche North America (Rancho Cucamonga, Calif.); www.borchenorthamerica.com; 909-498-4691 CNSmith Machinery Sales (Georgetown, Ont.); www.cnsmith.com; 416-917-3737

20 Canadian Plastics April 2021

Nordson Corp. and SAM North America LLC have made it possible to increase throughput and reduce coat weight in the extrusion coating of biopolymers such as polylactic acid (PLA) by encapsulating the edges of the coating with LDPE. The special encapsulating inserts developed by Nordson for its coextrusion feedblock allow for extruding additional material along either edge of this horizontal structure, making it possible to offset deficiencies of PLA – in particular its low melt strength – that have limited its melt curtain stability, drawdown ratio, line speed, and coat weight. The encapsulation inserts can be readily retrofitted into existing EDI feedblocks, and Nordson offers new EDI dies equipped with the EPC deckle system, which can be adjusted to reduce edge bead formation, and a melt flow system in which the edge encapsulation polymer is introduced in the die rather than in the feedblock. Nordson Corp. (Westlake, Ohio); www.nordson.com; 440-892-1580

MOLDS & TOOLING Ejector assembly securing system for safe transport of injection molds Hasco’s new Z732 ejector assembly securing system is designed to prevent unintentional movement of ejector assemblies within injection molds while they’re being transported. The system guarantees damage-free transport of injection molding tools by easily and effectively securing the ejector assembly, and is compact, easy-to-use, and can be installed without tools in the riser area. Available in two sizes, users can adjust the system to fit any mold by cutting the device’s securing pin to the correct length. An encapsulated magnet holds the system in place. The system is temperature-resistant up to 80°C or 176°F. Hasco Canada Inc. (Toronto); www.hasco.com; 800-387-9609

www.canplastics.com

technology showcase

MATERIALS Composites from reclaimed fishing nets Avient Corp.’s new Complēt R long fibre-reinforced composites incorporate post-consumer recycled nylon 6 material reclaimed from end-of-life fishing nets, and provide stiffness, strength, and toughness performance on par with standard nylon 6 long fibre formulations using virgin resin, making them well-suited as an alternative to metals. Potential applications include lighter-weight gear for outdoor recreation, next-generation vehicles that go further using fewer energy resources, and recycled-content office furnishings that contribute toward LEED certification for buildings. Formulations are available in a standard black colour at typical weight percentages of long glass fibre, long carbon fibre, or hybrid combinations. Avient Corp. (Avon Lake, Ohio); www.avient.com; 440-930-1000

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April 2022 Canadian Plastics

2019-11-20 2022-03-04 11:55 9:09 AM

technical tips

Six simple tricks to improve your injection molding By Jason Robinson, RJG Inc.

here’s room for improvement in virtually anything, and this definitely includes injection molding, which is the most common modern method of manufacturing plastic parts, largely because it’s ideal for producing high volumes of the same object. So, here are six simple tricks that you can implement to improve your injection molding.

1. DOCUMENT STANDARD PROCESS SHEETS

Having a standard process when starting the machine brings the process back to the same starting point every time. This will instill discipline and discourage the “Wild West gunslinger” mentality. It’s very difficult – if not impossible – to measure anything without a standard to measure against. Even if you know that the process isn’t fully optimized or doesn’t meet your expectations, documenting what and how to do things helps to measure improvements. Another benefit is that a few technicians on the shop floor may be more than capable of starting up a mold and making good parts without a setup sheet, but can everyone?

2. DON’T BLOCK CAVITIES

I’ll admit that this is much easier said than done, but coming up with a plan to minimize cavity blockage is a good start. This could involve investing in spare tooling components; investigating the root cause for the tool breaking; and training for setup personnel, technicians, and tool room staff. There are many reasons why this is important to do. First, if you have documented standard process sheets, you’ll now have to change settings when cavities are blocked; this then degrades the idea of a standard setup sheet. Second, consider the efficiency and economic

22 Canadian Plastics April 2022

impact – machines have to run longer to meet orders, and they’ll use more resin if the tool is a cold runner and regrind isn’t incorporated back into the mix.

3. SCHEDULE MATERIAL COLOUR CHANGES IN THE CORRECT ORDER

If certain machines run multiple colours throughout the month, it can be very beneficial to try to schedule the colours so as to start with the lightest colours and change to a darker colour each time. Ideally, you’ll finish the month in the darkest colour that the machine will run. Why? Colour contamination showing as black specs or streaks of the previous colour is time-consuming, hard to find, and usually results in reject parts. The cleaning of all the material handling equipment is also time-consuming and a little less forgiving if the next colour is darker, especially if the two colours are the same resin. If a machine can be dedicated to the same resin, that’s even better.

4. DON’T CHEAT ON DRYING

When a material supplier says a material needs to be dried, it really does. Too often we try and skip this step or not dry it for the correct time. This means drying at the correct temperature and the correct time. Keep in mind that plastic resin can also be over-dried – this can show as an increase in viscosity, an additive loss, or discolouration. If the material is not dried enough, it becomes very difficult to process, resulting in bad parts and tampering with the standard process settings to “fix” it. The best way to know if you’re drying properly is to use a moisture analyzer. The fact that the dryer is hot doesn’t necessarily mean that it’s drying properly.

5. DON’T USE STEEL TOOLS ON YOUR MOLDS

Too many times I’ve seen someone with the best of intentions grab a pair of steel pliers to pull a stuck part out of a mold. This causes serious tool damage. Yes, brass pliers and tools are more expensive, but nothing compared to the cost of repairing the mold. Ensure you have the right tools to work on the molds.

6. TAKE CARE OF YOUR PLATENS

It’s never too late to turn over a new leaf and start taking care of your platens when changing molds. Over time, rust and all kinds of buildup will accumulate on the platens. When molds are installed in the machines, sometimes the mold will hit the platens and create indentations or burrs. If this is left unchecked, it can build up enough to affect how the mold is receiving the applied tonnage. A four-inch dual grit axe sharpening stone, a rag, and some WD-40 are all that you need to get started. Cleaning the platen with a rag and WD-40, and then using the WD-40 and the stone will start removing the rust buildup and true up the platen again. This also needs to be done on the clamp plates of the mold. Taking five minutes at each mold change to do this is a good habit. Implementing these six injection molding tricks is a good first step towards making higher quality parts, reducing costs, lowering waste, and reducing mold damage. CPL Jason Robinson is a consultant/ trainer with RJG Inc., a Traverse City, Mich.-based training and consulting company that specializes in the injection molding industry. Visit www.rjginc.com for more. www.canplastics.com

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