Hosokawa Alpine presented Alpine X die heads

When it comes to innovation and technology, Alpine blown film lines are the most advanced products currently available. Alpine die heads and extruders of X generation are rumored to be the best in the market. Visitors to booth D06 in hall 16 at K 2013 will experience an exciting presentation: in addition to several advancements, Hosokawa Alpine will launch some impressive innovative products. Details will be announced shortly before the trade show.

Alpine X die heads – more layers means more options
When Hosokawa Alpine presented a 5-layer coextrusion line three years ago, they triggered an important development: their new 5-layer technology helped reduce the film thickness level by between 5% and 10 % compared to 3-layer films while saving material and resources and at no detriment to the excellent mechanical film property. Many visitors to the Alpine Hosokawa booth came away impressed and convinced. Today, the market is experiencing a general shift from 3-layer to 5-layer film structures.

Hosokawa Alpine 5-layer blown film lines can process polyolefins as well as barrier materials such as PA and EVOH without extruder changes. For processors, the benefit introduces a high level of versatility and opens up new areas of application.
Increasing the layers of a film structure allows more versatility and results in higher cost-efficiency, as different raw materials can be combined. A higher the number of layers, the more precisely the film’s properties can be configured. This development will continue and is far from over, although we have now moved on to 9-layer lines. At K 2013, Hosokawa Alpine will provide a live demonstration of the production of different 5-layer structures.

Oriented film has many benefits
With more than thirty sold lines, Hosokawa Alpine is the unrivalled leader in the market for monoaxial film orientation lines (MDO). During the orientation process, blown film is stretched in the direction of the machine direction between two rollers that run at different speeds. The resulting stretch ratio is dictated by the processed raw material. The film orientation process allows processors to influence the film properties. Thanks to this technology film thickness, tensile strength, elongation in machine direction, stiffness, puncture resistance, shrink, tear resistance and deadfold properties, material density, gloss, transparency, barrier effect and water vapor permeability of blown films can be systematically optimized to suit the application at hand.

Reducing trim waste with the patented TRIO system
During the orientation process, the film is constricted in the transverse direction and its width is reduced. This neck-in has the effect that the thickness of the oriented film increases gradually from the center towards both edges.

The TRIO trim reduction for inline orientation is a special thickness control system. It reduces the thickness variation on the edges of the film and balances the thickness profile of the reel with the result of an excellent flatness of the film. The entire process becomes more efficient. At K 2013, Hosokawa Alpine will run the first live demonstration of the TRIO System at an international trade show. Oriented by TRIO, blown film can be perfectly printed and laminated. Due to significant raw material savings, the higher investment pays off quickly. MDO film is now perfectly suitable for many established and new applications.

Source: Hosokawa Alpine