The markets driving the increased level of activity are material handling (pallets and boxes), underground enclosures for telecommunications and utilities, drainage and irrigation products, ATV components, commercial/institutional, and industrial and safety products. Milacron is also seeing other new products being developed that are conversions from concrete, metal, and wood in the building and infrastructure market as well.
Eric Hallstrom, Business Manager, Milacron LPIM added, "Milacron has been promoting our proprietary Structural Web technology that allows for multi-point gas assist molding that can be added to as an option to our standard LPIM machine. The process allows for a cosmetic part appearance for large projected area parts and can reduce part weights by up to 20%. The gas assist process also creates an inherently strong and durable part, molded with low internal stresses and a dual wall thickness which can replace many rotational molded or industrial blow molded parts with better aesthetics and better cycle times for higher volume parts."
Milacron has aggressively expanded its rebuild and remanufacture capabilities for LPIM machines for customers. There are a large number of old LPIM machines in the field that were purchased in the late 1980's and 90's that are in need of rebuilds and upgrades to control systems and new motor and drive selections, moving away from DC to AC drives which provide better energy efficiency. Milacron's full remanufacturing consists of fully rebuilding the machine to current model specifications, including full teardown and inspection, platen refurbishment, full re-painting of the machine, new controls, electrical system, and hydraulics. The major tonnage and injection cylinders and hydraulic accumulators are sent out for refurbishment and resealing. New screws, barrels, and injection melt accumulators are also included as part of this program.
Hallstrom added, "Essentially we are updating machines that have been in production for over 30 years and bringing them up to the same specifications as our new machines. This has been especially popular since we started to promote this capability to our customers, as they see a significant enough savings since we are re-using the most expensive parts of these large machines, being the bases, platens, and cylinders. The customer gets back a machine that outperforms the machine’s original specifications and is as reliable as a new machine with the same warranty."
Milacron continues to push the boundaries of possibilities in plastics with breakthrough products from leading brands including Milacron, Mold-Masters, DME, Ferromatik, Uniloy, and CIMCOOL. All Milacron product brands offer industry-leading service, support, and spare parts inventory – trust only Milacron trained experts to ensure your assets run at peak performance.
Source: Milacron
