Erema, the Austrian manufacturer of plastic recycling systems, and their technology partner Techno Plastic s.r.l., Castelfranco Emilia (Modena), are to hold a special symposium on "PET Strapping", the inline processing of PET bottle flake to make strapping and monofilaments, on the 27th and 28th of October this year.This Open House event at Erema's Ansfelden headquarters will feature the demonstration of a system optimised especially for the manufacture of PET strapping, consisting of an Erema Vacurema Basic 1308 TE-VSV extrusion system and a Techno Plastic Tight Strap 300 stretching plant connected directly to it. The throughput of the plant is up to 300 kg/h of high-strength strapping bands with a small cross-section, resulting in the cost-efficient use of raw materials.
In addition to the live demonstrations there will also be presentations given by experts from Erema and Techno Plastic on the process and plant technology as demonstrated for the manufacture of PET strapping bands and PET filaments from washed PET bottle flake. The benefits of Vacurema technology instead of the conventional combination of individual units comprising crystalliser, drier and extruder, which save energy and costs in a single processing step, will be explained in detail. The symposium will be identical on both days and due to the international background of the participants expected to attend, the speeches will be delivered in English.
The single-stage Vacurema Basic technology works with a patented vacuum reactor that features rotating tools and has a larger design especially for this application. It is linked to a single screw extruder system with high-performance degassing. The starting material, in this case PET bottle flake, is fed into the vacuum reactor directly via a vacuum lock without any precrystallisation or predrying. The material is then mixed, heated (though friction), dried, crystallised and volatile contaminants are removed simultaneously in a vacuum, all in one single pass.
The downstream extruder plastifies and homogenises the material, degasses the melt and conveys it without an additional melt pump directly into a fine filter with an integrated, fully automatic self-cleaning system. The result is an extremely fine filtered melt which is then processed directly into PET strapping bands on the PET strapping system.
