A recent open house held at Davis-Standard’s ER-WE-PA GmbH facility in Erkrath, Germany, unveiled the industry’s first in-line cast pre-stretch technology – the Davis-Standard dsX s-tretch cast film line.
Davis-Standard collaborated with Dow Europe to demonstrate the line along with newly developed Dow Elite and Elite AT resins. Nearly 50 customers from Europe and Asia attended the event, which showcased 8µ pre-stretch and 15µ conventional films at speeds of 1000 meters per minute and 750 meters per minute on 2-inch cores with a winder cycle time of less than 25 seconds.
The dsX s-tretch is the first cast film line of its kind, offering an alternative to pre-stretching techniques traditionally done off-line or on blown film lines. With this new technology, processors can produce thinner films at higher line speeds with improved physical properties and load retention. From a cost and environmental standpoint, processors benefit from consistently high quality pre-stretch film produced with greater efficiency and reduced waste via coreless winding.
“The open house was very well received from the perspective of both equipment and raw materials,” says Steve Post, Davis-Standard vice president of cast film. “We were able to show exciting new technologies that deliver pre-stretch film as thin as 6 microns at speeds from 550 to 1000 meters per minute (1,800 to 3,280 fpm). Higher outputs, better energy efficiency and a faster return on investment are all priorities in a cost-cutting marketplace. That is what this line offers.”
The dsX s-tretch is designed with space-saving versatility at 2-meter, 3-meter, 4-meter, and 4.5-meter widths (6.5 to 15 feet). The S³ winder winds hand and machine rolls up to 10 inches diameter on the 2-meter and 3-meter versions while winding hand, machine and jumbo rolls up to 16 inches diameter on the 4-meter and 4.5-meter versions. The line is equipped to support a wide range of resins from conventional LLD to metallocenes, propylenes and elastomers. Engineering advantages include lowboy extruders, DSB II feedscrews, a Cloeren feedblock, die and vacuum box, MDO stretching, bleedless guiding and 2-inch thin core or coreless winding technology. The line is also pre-configured for availability within six months of order to acceptance. Resins showcased by Dow included their latest Elite enhanced polyethylene resins designed for the fabrication of high performance machine stretch and pre-oriented wrap films.
Davis-Standard LLC
(860) 599-1010
