Pakistan Textile Journal. march index

Exhibitors represent every aspect of the nonwovens industry from raw materials, machinery and equipment suppliers to converters and brand owners, in addition to auxiliary and testing equipment manufacturers, environmental protection, trade associations, publishers and other related areas. Key industry sectors in this report automotive, cleaning and hygiene, composites, construction, filtration, home furnishing, medical and packaging.

According to the organizers, the Automotive and filtration products and machinery based exhibitors showed 20% growth between INDEX 02 and INDEX 08 in terms of visitors interested specifically in nonwovens for durable applications. it is also possible that filtration has a very diverse and wide range of applications, including food and liquids, heating and air conditioning, automotive, surgical, face masks and other uses related to air and water quality.

New product line Vanguard Pack Line with automatic bag filling system for adult/baby diapers, composed of two-exit horizontal stacker with automatic bag filler and mechanical compression unit on the manual exit. Full-servo product, optimized for user-friendly operation and format change and maximum efficiency and reliability proven on several significant installations.

Avery Dennison’s latest breakthrough – SoftSide, is an elastic side panel, designed as an advanced component of a diaper closure system in combination with a mechanical closure tape or incorporated hook zone. The tailored elasticity and increased softness are especially developed to guarantee excellent diaper-fit and superior comfort for baby diapers and adult incontinence briefs.

Avery Dennison Medical presented latest development in the surgical field: The MED 5564A Silver based anti microbial incise film. This film is an essential component in any prevention program currently being deployed by most hospitals around the world, in an attempt to provide a long term answer to Surgical Site Infections (SSI’s) and particularly to the growing inefficacy of antibiotic prophylaxis.

Idrosistem energy introduces a new patented system for water filtration that combines, in the same equipment, flotation and filtration. It is an ideal solution for recycling water back to the customers’ production process, meeting water production quality discharge requirements.

The new Rieter meltblown system offers the best basis weight distributions and the finest and most uniform fiber size distributions in the industry for fabrics from 1 gsm to 500 gsm. The monolithic Rieter meltblown process is perfectly designed for filtration, face masks and wipes applications and the combination of Rieter spunbond and the New Meltblown technology produces SMS webs covering the entire range of products to support hygiene, medical and filtration markets.

JETlace essential, the latest spunlace technology development is the result of more than 25 years of experience in spunlace which allows Rieter to offer a machine configuration for the production of light weight spunlace fabrics from 30 to 80 gsm with capacities up to 2,700 Kg/hr.

In fact, with over 150 spunlace lines installed globally, Rieter is the world leader and innovator in spunlace technology, and is able to offer designs for wipes, hygiene, medical, surgical and technical applications in accordance with rigid customer requirements.

BHT Bicma has developed an applicator for elastic ears with reduced waste-shape and also a zero-waste ear applicator. The concept is based on BICMA’s well-experienced and electronical repitch technology.

Customer benefits will be minimum space requirement, easy handling and easy size changes. The low-waste version has been successfully tested and is now available. Bicma has also developed a new machine for light incontinence products with 1 or 2 cores and single wrap or quick wrap/ easypack feature. These products have short foam elastics at the sides. These features are also available as retrofit of existing machines.

The neXdetect – winner of an Index-Award - is unique in the detection of invisible chemical stripe applications on nonwovens and it can be used in-line as well as off-line. A measuring head traverses the web during running production. The measuring head remits specific electrical stimulus signals to the web surface. The hydrophilic stripes on the web change the electrical field in a distinctive reproducible way, so that the neXdetect can clearly distinguish between finished areas and the raw material.

A range of nonwovens technologies, including the Power-Therm DT dryer, which offers energy savings and improved productivity in the thermal and chemical treatment of nonwovens was presented by Bruckner plant technologies.

Ciba presented products for high-quality meltblown nonwovens made with spunbond polypropylene; as well as enhanced effects for nonwovens including Ciba® Irgasurf® HL 560 hydrophilicity additive, Flamestab® NOR™ 116 halogen-free flame retardant for polyolefins, Chimassorb® 2020 light and thermal stabilizer; and Cromophtal® and Irgalite®colorants.

For the first time at INDEX, INOTIS displayed its new aperture version of its LICIAL woodpulp/polyester spunlace fabric. LICIAL “APERTURED –S-“ has the same high strength characteristics as other LICIAL versions and benefits equally from the low-lint and particle characteristics proper to it manufacturing process.

However, it is very different from other apertured versions because of the fact that it is the only low-lint fabric combining an absorbent and highly absorbent side with a bulky and soft side. It gives a 3-dimensional effect enabling to scratch difficult contaminant off surfaces whilst giving a pleasant and soft hand at the same time.

The SteamJet line, newly developed in collaboration with the Germany-based Saxon Textile Research Institute, for bonding of nonwovens using overheated steam jets; in addition to various versions of its AquaJet spunlace technology by Fleissner attracted qualified visitors.

At INDEX-08 Jurmet presented latest slitter rewinder with top run of material, model Master2. This model runs at web width of 1300 mm and has a diameter of 800 mm. The slitter is equipped with an automatic knife and core positioning system, with an integrated control system including enlarged possibilities compared to the previous versions. The slitter Master2 can be equipped with various additional automatic components in order to increase productivity even more.

Tredegar introduced new designs in the ComfortAire™ line of aperture laminate topsheets. ComfortAire is a highloft and flexible nonwoven laminate that combines the softness of a nonwoven with the strike through and rewet performance of an apertured film, allowing consumers to enjoy protection with comfort. The new designs take the aesthetic appeal and performance standards of ComfortAire even higher. Colored versions of ComfortAire were also introduced. One of Tredegar Film Products’ latest premium topsheet concepts is SoftAire™ - an innovative, sophisticated film structure reducing skin contact area, leading to optimal comfort and softness. Tredegar Film Products introduced the FlexAire™ platform of elastic laminates. FlexAire elastic laminates are supersoft, high stretch laminates for large area applications such as baby diaper ears, side panels and adult incontinence garments. FlexAire is available in several new grades specifically designed for stretch ear applications.

A.Celli Nonwovens presented its new generation of winders and slitter-rewinders specifically developed for top performing spunmelt lines. To complement the technological advances in winding and splitting A.Celli present Slittopack, which integrates roll handling, packaging and slitting for sorting, labeling and wrapping reels into bundles downstream. Also to be shown is Wingformer, A.Celli Nonwovens’ proprietary technology for airlaid web formation.

AccuSentry introduced Subtle Layer Detection technology to enable the inspection of embedded components inside web layers. This technology enables a breakthrough that allows precise tracking of the embedded component placements that are barely visible with human eyes. Accusentry also released the Sentry 9000 7.0 software for its flagship Sentry 9000® systems. It delivers dozens of enhancements such as Contour Detection, Object Matching, Advanced Image Filtering, Defect Mapping, Variety of Graphs and Charts, and OPC Communication Package. It is an ideal integrated inspection development environment for delivering customized, differentiated and targeted solutions.

Bikoma presented their new model DEDE 500 for the production of baby diapers together with their newly developed packaging machine DSP 40 for baby diapers. Production speed of this machine is 400 pieces/minute.