Winning Combo: Sonixs Bundlers with PET Strapping
Hazle Township, PA – Historically, Polypropylene (PP) strapping has been used for lighter, high-speed bundling and carton closing applications and Polyester (PET) strapping for securing larger, heavier pallet loads and shipping units. While PET has carried a higher price per unit length of strapping, its advantages in machine operation, resistance to elongation, and ability to maintain tension during storage, justified the cost differential.
PET strapping can now be manufactured from recycled materials, dramatically lowering strapping costs. Today, even with the 35% density difference between the two plastics, PET strappings can be manufactured at approximately the same cost per unit length as PP, which continues to be made from virgin resins. In addition to the lower resin cost base, PET costs have been more stable than PP which fluctuates with the petroleum market.
To date however, PET hasn’t found a market in lighter bundling applications. The reason is that virtually all machines in this segment use a hot blade to melt opposing strap surfaces to heat seal strap ends. This is not a practical solution for PET because of its melting characteristics and an irritating and unhealthful emission in the smoke given off during the sealing process. However, Mosca has solved the heat seal problem. The Mosca Sonixs ultra-sonic sealing system makes equally strong seals with PP and PET with no emissions, making it a great solution for running PET strap in the Company’s high-speed bundlers.
The most common performance issues with PP strapping concern brittleness that leads to splitting and dusting generation during machine operation, and camber, a strap curvature that can cause it to bind in feed tracks, creating machine faults that stall user packing lines. PET has superior characteristics in both cases, running cleaner and straighter. In addition, its superior stiffness for similar strap cross sections further help its feed reliability, leading to higher strapping process uptime.
A further advantage is that PET stays tight on packages during storage. While initial tension applied with PP straps tends to dissipate fairly quickly, PET strap maintains its tightness, making a significant advantage for products that remain in their strapped state for a length of time.
Sustainability is another PET advantage. It is manufactured from recycled materials, and it can be rebuilt during the recycling process and reused multiple times in comparison to recycled PP that degrades when processed and not yet able to be upgraded to virgin condition.
EAM-Mosca has recently introduced several PET bundler straps and sold them selectively to interested customers with Sonixs strappers. Customer feedback has been uniformly enthusiastic. Here is an example from an office furniture customer email:
“WE LOVE IT! I will work … to get this changed over to this new strapping. Everyone has nothing but positive things to say about it. Thanks for recommending this to us.”
About
EAM-Mosca Corporation provides high-performance strapping system solutions to a variety of industries, including food, graphic arts, mailing, fulfillment, logistics, corrugated, wood, and other industrial or consumer goods. The company combines innovative equipment with strapping materials manufactured to maximize machine performance, and customer support programs that help customers meet their performance and productivity goals.
To learn more about any of EAM-Mosca’s other productivity enhancing strapping systems, please call 800-456-3420, or email info@www.eammosca.com. You can also connect with EAM-Mosca on YouTube (www.youtube.com/EAMMoscaCorp), Twitter (www.twitter.com/EAMMoscaCorp) or LinkedIn and FaceBook via the links above.