Davis-Standard LLC has restructured its business into two operating units: Converting Systems and Extrusion Systems.
The company in Pawcatuck last year merged with Black Clawson Converting Machinery Co. in Fulton N.Y. The Converting Systems Group is based in Fulton, while Extrusion Systems is in Pawcatuck.
``We have a large and well-respected product line for both converting and extrusion,'' said President Charles Buckley. ``This allows us to take advantage of the best elements of our combined assets to serve our customers.''
Converting Systems includes cast and blown film, pelletizing, liquid coating, blow molding, extrusion coating and winding. Extrusion Systems covers fiber, sheet, elastomers, laboratory and specialty systems, wire and cable, pipe, profile and tubing, compounding, recycling and reclaim.
Officials also announced the Converting Systems Group has upgraded its extrusion pilot laboratory in Fulton. The lab, equipped with a Black Clawson coextrusion line, is aimed at a range of applications, including cast polypropylene films, stretch wrap, packaging films, flexible packaging and board coating.
The line uses the latest AC vector drive technology form SSD Drives. A robot winder has an Allen-Bradley servodrive system, for high-speed, high-torque spindle positioning and accurate position feedback through fiber-optic communications.
``In addition to the extruders and winder, we have a range of feedblocks, dies, feedscrews and testing equipment to accommodate just about every converting process,'' said Richard Tetro, vice president of technology for the Converting Systems Group.
The Fulton factory also has a large-scale production coating facility, for customer research and development, toll coating and small production runs.
In product news, Davis-Standard:
* Introduced a duct tubing line for running multilayer tubing for fiber optics. The line, used for processing high density polyethylene tubing, features two layers. The inside layer has small serrations and a thin silicone PE coating to reduce friction, important for feeding fiber-optic cables down long tubes. The outer layer has four stripes for color coding identification.
* Rolled out the Merritt Cascade extruder to turn reclaimed plastic back into pellets, featuring venting to remove volatiles, such as ink or moisture. Equipment includes an in-line shredder, ram-stuffer extruder, hot-melt transfer pipe, vacuum chamber and devolitization head, a secondary hot-melt extruder, pelletizer, feedscrews and a control system.
The system is modular, so customers can buy the entire package or select individual components to fit into existing reclaim lines.
* Announced that it retrofits gearboxes for non-Davis Standard brand extruders. The company said many old gearbox brands are no longer supported by the original extruder maker.
* Said the Converting Systems Group now offers a direct replacement for the Egan CMR control unit, called the Integrator C. New features include recipe management, historical data trending and alarms, a new programmable logic controller drives interface, improved temperature controls and better gauge control, based on the age of the existing gauge system.
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