From the Sector

Protective masks for Europe
With FleeceforEurope and Lindenpartner, Düsseldorf-based Kloepfel Group purchasing consultancy and Berlin-based industrial consultancy Bechinger & Heymann Holding plan to manufacture and distribute up to 50 million protection class FFP1 through FFP3 respiratory masks a month exclusively for the European market from the beginning of fall. And the primary focus will be on quality.
With protective masks – including those used in operating rooms – this quality is provided above all by  virus-absorbing nonwovens. And these will be manufactured by ‘FleeceforEurope’ using an Oerlikon Nonwoven meltblown system.
But masks effectively protecting against infections can only be guaranteed with the right quality. A crucial factor in this is the inside of the mask. Because the nonwoven used in protection class FFP1 through FFP3 respiratory masks plays a decisive role.
Here, the meltblown technology from Oerlikon Nonwoven will be deployed. In a special, patented process, the fibers laid into a nonwoven fabric during manufacture are subsequently electrostatically-charged, before the material is further processed downstream.

European market for protective masks with a promising future
Those responsible at Oerlikon Nonwoven and FleeceforEurope, which will primarily focus on producing high-end nonwovens, and Lindenpartner, which will manufacture and distribute the protective masks, are certain of one thing: the market for protective masks has a very promising long-term future in Europe.
What has been commonplace in Asia for many years now will also become normal in Europe. People will be increasingly wearing face masks when venturing out, in order to better protect themselves against health risks such as the current pandemic and also against increasing environmental pollution in the form of  fine particles and exhaust fumes in the future. A

Medical face masks from a vending machine
Mask producer Lindenpartner has already secured supplies of nonwovens and will be producing face masks for the European healthcare sector over the coming weeks. To fight the coronavirus pandemic, Lindenpartner is planning to install 100 self-service face mask vending machines in Germany over the next four weeks, positioning them in publicly-accessible places such as shopping centers and airports, for example.

• Antiviral properties of Sanitized® products on synthetics validated

Tests conducted by independent laboratories have now confirmed that a treatment with Sanitized® T 99-19 and Sanitized® T 11-15 reduces the viral load on PES textiles by
up to 99 %.

Swiss company SANITIZED AG announces the validation from impartial labs that Sanitized®T 99-19 and Sanitized®T 11-15 are also effective against viruses (in accordance with ISO 18184:2019). Tests were performed using a feline coronavirus with structures and mechanisms reminiscent of SARS-Cov2. Patented technology featuring an ammonium silicate compound  is employed in Sanitized®T 99-19 and Sanitized®T 11-15 utilizes tried and tested silver technology.

These additives are the perfect tool for an antiviral and antibacterial treatment of face masks, protective professional medical clothing, bed linens, or mattresses. The formulation of both products remains completely untouched, thus ensuring that it will continue to offer outstanding protection against bacteria.

Before a final product’s antiviral properties can be publicly promoted, viral tests must be performed in specialized laboratories. Compliance with local legal regulations is essential here. SANITIZED AG explicitly points out that this is standard procedure and has composed a preliminary Guide for Treating PPE (personal protective equipment) with biocide products.

Guide Link: https://campaign.sanitized.com/en/treatment-of-ppe-with-biocidal-products

Textile and nonwoven associations issued a joint statement today urging federal, state and local governments to deem textile and nonwoven manufacturing facilities as “essential” when drafting “Shelter in Place” orders in response to the COVID-19 crisis.

Our associations recognize the serious challenges our elected officials, health administrators, and others are facing when issuing orders to protect communities across the country and we understand the necessity for leaders to enforce a ‘Shelter in Place” order or quarantine orders.

Our members make a broad range of inputs and finished products used in an array of personal protective equipment (PPE) and medical nonwoven/textile supplies, including surgical gowns, face masks, antibacterial wipes, lab coats, blood pressure cuffs, cotton swabs and hazmat suits. These items are vital to the government’s effort to ramp up emergency production of these critical supplies.

If workers who produce these goods are not granted an “essential” exemption from “Shelter in Place” and other quarantine orders to go to their manufacturing and distribution facilities, it will cause major disruptions in the availability of these goods. This will create significant hardship to healthcare providers and consumers across the country who depend on steady and stable supplies of these critical items.

We are asking the administration and state and local authorities to provide greater certainty and clarity for our companies and employees and ask for a clear exclusion of our manufacturing operations from “Shelter in Place” orders as the textile and nonwoven products that we make in the U.S. play an essential role in mitigating the shortages of critical supplies. Such a designation will help us avoid disruptions of vital goods and services during this challenging time.

Hexcel’s Leading Position in Aerospace and Automotive Makes Hexcel a Trusted Partner for Urban Air Mobility

At this year’s JEC World in Paris on March 3-5, Hexcel will highlight the growing need for innovations in composite materials to support the emerging Urban Air Mobility (UAM) market.

Urban air mobility – urban transportation systems that move people by air or enable cargo deliveries – is the next big transportation innovation. Similar to taxis or ride sharing today, UAM will help remove congestion from our streets and provide a convenient, rapid method for travel in urban centers as well as in remote areas.

Advanced composite materials will be at the heart of UAM vehicles by providing lightweight, efficient, reliable, and cost-competitive options for manufacturing. “Materials have been a key driver of efficiency for aircraft today, and they will be even more important for the emerging UAM marketplace,” said Imad Atallah, Director of Strategic Marketing for Aerospace and Urban Air Mobility at Hexcel.

Already, Hexcel is a leader in advanced composite materials for the aerospace market and is a key supplier of composite materials to the automotive industry. So, the company is well positioned to offer solutions to meet the critical needs of high-rate and quick-part manufacturing cycles, in addition to low-cost needs for this space. Hexcel’s materials solutions approach for UAM is to make it greener and more sustainable, safer, more comfortable, and more affordable.

Hexcel’s broad range of carbon fiber and HexPly® prepreg solutions, including snap cure thermosets and thermoplastics, coupled with the most qualified positions on aerospace programs in the industry make the company a trusted partner for UAM. In addition to offering composite materials from carbon fibers, prepregs, honeycomb and reinforcements, Hexcel’s best-performing market solution in noise absorption on aircraft jet engines, Acousti-Cap®, provides a strong position of innovation to solve one of the most critical problems in the UAM space – community noise. “We are applying our technologies to the unique needs of urban air mobility vehicles,” Atallah said.

Hexcel’s ability to bring materials technology from the aerospace and automotive industries represents a unique strength in solving the critical challenges of UAM, especially around high-rate manufacturing, low-cost materials, light weighting, and noise. “Both thermoplastics and quick-cure thermoset materials are expected to have applications on UAM vehicles,” Atallah said. Furthermore, Hexcel’s broad product portfolio including unsized carbon fiber has proven to be the most compatible with thermoplastic resins from a consolidation perspective.

At this year’s trade fair „SIMAC Tanning Tech“, PFAFF Industrial, together with DÜRKOPP ADLER and the regional agency DAP ITALIA, will present the latest solutions for shoe and leather processing. The fair will take place in Milan from 19th to 21st of February 2020. The joint booth is located in Hall 14, No. C09.

PFAFF News and Highlights:

PFAFF 3806
New integrated workplace for closing rub-down seams, such as heel-, front- and side seams on street shoes, slippers and leg boots. The PFAFF 3806 is equipped with two-thread chainstitch high-speed seamer head PFAFF 5487 with drop feed and variable top feed, high lift and adjustable top feed pressure, which ensures consistently high quality. Reinforcing tapes, which may be applied from top impart greater durability to the seams and prevent fine leathers from being pulled out of shape. Automatic control sequences (via parameter or photocell) reduce the manual handling and increase the process reliability and output.

PFAFF 1591
On the fair PFAFF INDUSTRIAL will show its electronic single-needle shoe post-bed machine with touch-control panel, new thread trimmer for short thread ends (< 5 mm) and new programmable thread tension. The key benefit of “programmable thread tension” is that suitable thread tensions can be applied for different material thicknesses and/or for different seam sequences (as these can be programmed on electronic machines). The tensions can be accessed and/or set via a knee switch or stitch counting. Manual setting of the thread tension, as is common with current shoe machines, is no longer necessary with the programmed thread tension.

PFAFF 8303i
The ot-air taping machine for welding continuous seams on water-resistant, waterproof and breathable materials will be exhibited as “shoe version” with very small/slim post from back. Effortlessly shoe uppers with small radii can be taped. The slim post and the differential feed (via two separate drive motors for the top and bottom feed roller) ensures absolute neat seams and a requested fullness und shaped parts.
 

Hexcel is collaborating with NaCa Systems, a Tier 1 supplier of natural fiber composite automotive interior parts, on the development of a lightweight carbon fiber prepreg and wood fiber composite sportscar seat back using a rapid press molding process. This innovation validates a short cycle time production process for CFRP and wood fiber composite parts and offers a host of benefits to automotive manufacturers.

Hexcel supplies NaCa Systems with an optimized version of its HexPly® M77CS epoxy prepreg material. HexPly® M77CS is a fast curing hotmelt, thermosetting epoxy matrix, specifically designed for prepreg applications for which short cure cycles and clear surfaces with perfect aesthetics are required.

The lightweight seat back demonstrates a 40% weight saving compared to a typical injection molded plastic component whilst also featuring a significantly improved CO2 footprint vs a full carbon part. The prepreg and wood fiber structure doesn’t produce sharp edged pieces when damaged. In addition, wood fiber composites also increase sound absorption, contributing to improved NVH damping within the vehicle interior.

The NaCa Systems seat back will be on display on the Hexcel stand at JEC World 2020.

The origins of both Industry 4.0 and an awareness of the need for more sustainable manufacturing methods can arguably be traced back to the year 1971.

It was in 1971 that the first microprocessor was introduced by Intel, and also that the first and perhaps now most well-known environmental campaigner, Greenpeace, was founded.

As such, a direct line can be charted from that year to today’s automated textile manufacturing machinery concepts, as well as the drive to develop more increasingly resource-efficient processes.

All of the recent innovations which have been introduced to the market by A. Monforts Textilmaschinen GmbH & Co. KG, for example, are being powered by the possibilities of Industry 4.0 and developed in response to the market demand for more sustainable production.

They include the new ‘digital twinning’ capability introduced in 2019 for all Monforts machines, with advanced sensor technologies which make it possible to access comprehensive technical machine data from any location using the company’s Smart Support and Smart Check apps. In addition, the digital twin system provides information on individual wear parts, such as, for example, converters or gears.

These latest developments have been very favourably received by Monforts customers, especially in Europe.

50th anniversary
The very first Heimtextil – the leading trade fair for the home textiles market – was also held in Frankfurt in January 1971 and Monforts customers Bierbaum Group and Konrad Hornschuch AG are amongst the German companies who were there from the very start and have attended every annual show since.

Bierbaum Group, based in Borken, is the company behind the well-known Irisette bedding brand and is celebrating its own 125th anniversary in 2020. It has also introduced products bearing the German government’s new Grüner Knopf textile seal of approval for sustainable production.

As a specialist in synthetic leathers for home surfaces, as well as vehicle interiors, Konrad Hornschuch AG, of Weissbach, has been a member of the €44 billion automotive giant Continental AG since 2016.

Representatives from both companies received memorial trophies at a special presentation held on January 7th during the 50th anniversary Heimtextil show.

The home textiles market remains very strong in Germany, with sales amounting to some €9.6 billion in 2019, according to analyst IFH Cologne.

Global growth
The first Heimtextil in 1971 was a significant success, attracting 679 exhibitors from 26 countries.

This year’s show, however, attracted a total of 2,952 exhibitors from 66 countries, reflecting not only the growth of the home textiles industry, but also the globalisation which has taken place over the last half century.

Monforts now has customers for its advanced finishing technologies around the world, with home textile customers from India and Pakistan being particularly well represented at Heimtextil 2020.

Among stand outs from Indian companies at this year’s show was the 2020 collection of Welspun India’s famous Christy England brand, inspired by botanical studies of the gardens of British stately homes. Welspun towels meanwhile benefit from the company’s HygroCotton hollow core yarn technology, produced by a proprietary spinning method which ensures they become softer, fluffier and more absorbent after every wash.

An equally ground-breaking new technology is being introduced by Trident Group, which is one of India’s largest vertically-integrated home textiles manufacturers and two years ago installed five complete Monforts finishing ranges for its new linen department.

Trident’s patented Air Rich yarns feature pores throughout their cross sections for high breathability and absorbency, as well as rapid drying.

Monforts home textile customers from Pakistan stressed the resource efficiency of their processes and products as a result of investments in advanced technology, and during the show the ‘Sustainable Pakistan’ initiative was announced.

Supported by GIZ, the German Society for International Cooperation, the initiative aims to reshape global perceptions of Pakistan’s manufacturers and their innovations. So far, twenty producers have been carefully chosen to be presented on this global platform and will help rebrand Pakistan’s textile industry at the Heimtextil exhibitions going forward.

Heimtextil’s organiser Messe Frankfurt also announced its own new alliance with the United Nations Office for Partnerships, in order to support the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals.

Constancy
Many things have changed since 1971 and home interiors are certainly no longer predominantly orange and brown – and perhaps unlikely to ever become so again.

It’s clear, however, that there has been a constancy in the push to consistently improve textile technologies, processes and products that may have originated in Europe, but have subsequently spread around the world.

And the significance of both microprocessors and sustainability in 2020 could only have been guessed at back in 1971.

Innovative cleaning cloth material and solvent formulas reduce environmental impact for offset printers
Baldwin Technology Company Inc. has announced innovations within its PREPAC® Advanced product line of original cleaning consumables. Designed for newspaper, commercial web and sheet-fed presses, the new technologies optimize production time by shortening the cleaning cycle and minimizing waste.

All Baldwin original PREPAC consumables offer pre-impregnated wet cloth rolls with high ink and lint absorption capacity, so printers can achieve cleaning results that are 100 percent accurate with every run. The next generation of PREPAC Advanced consumables features unique and regionalized solvent formulas, as well as a new sophisticated cloth material. Compared to other products on the market, Baldwin’s solutions decrease waste up to 50 percent and can cut cleaning cycles in half, enabling up to 100 extra production hours annually.

“Since its introduction in 1995, PREPAC has remained the top choice for pre-impregnated wet cloth rolls. If it’s not Baldwin, it’s not PREPAC,” explained Tomas Anderbjer, President, Precision Applications, at Baldwin. “With the new PREPAC Advanced consumables, Baldwin once again innovates blanket and impression cylinder cleaning for the print industry, providing technologies that optimize productivity and decrease the impact on the environment.”

• Kiian Digital will present the latest update of “Bellagio” reactive inks
• The series promises unexpected performance and efficiency

JK Group will attend Heimtextil (7 – 10 January 2020 Frankfurt am Main) – the global event for interior textiles trends – through Kiian Digital brand, revealing the last update of Digistar Bellagio reactive ink series alongside the complete product portfolio designed for Textile Printing.

Bellagio series will benefit from a custom-made waveform for MS's printing machines. “Our R&D Teams have done a long fine-tuning on the formula, working side by side with MS Team to setup a bespoke waveform, reaching top printing performance” explains Marco Girola, JK & MS Marketing and Communication Manager “this is the outcome of the synergic job among the teams, making the difference” ends Girola.

The custom-made waveform is a keynote of Bellagio series which offers an unmatched result in terms of reliability, lower wear of printheads and quality of prints outcome.  At the booth visitors will attend live-demos of Bellagio printing by a MS JP4 EVO 3200 printing machine.

Next to Digistar Bellagio series there will be Digistar Bravo.

Disperse ink for polyester direct printing which has recorded great success since its debut. Even Bravo series shows a customized waveform developed for MS's printing machines. Bravo is Kiian Digital’s flagship for printing home textile fabrics thanks to the absolute level of its general fastness: washing, light and rubbing; as well as the wide color range. JK Group’s experts will explain to visitors the uniqueness and benefits of the customized waveform on quality and production efficiency. Lastly, a space dedicated to Digistar K-Choice, textile direct pigment series, cannot miss.

For the Textile Industry, making every production’s step more sustainable has become a must and it has always been a priority commitment for JK Group. Our experts will not fail to deepen topics about textile standards and compliance with the worldwide most restrictive regulations, helping to make the choice of a textile sustainable production chain concrete and aware.

Lighter, quieter and more environmentally-friendly vehicles ‒ this is what Hybrid-Acoustics PET from Autoneum stands for. The product innovation for the engine bay is not only characterized by its lightweight construction and noise protection optimized for electric vehicles, it also convinces through sustainability: Components made of Hybrid-Acoustics PET consist entirely of PET, which is largely obtained from recycled fibers, and thus meet customer demand for environmentally-friendly mobility solutions.

With Hybrid-Acoustics PET, Autoneum has adapted its textile interior technology Hybrid-Acoustics for use in the engine compartment. The patented innovation is based on a unique fiber material that acts as an insulator and absorber at the same time. Among others, Hybrid-Acoustics PET is used to encapsulate electric motors, thereby reducing noise directly at the source and particularly attenuating high-frequency sounds of the electric drive unit. This key technology accordingly ensures optimum noise protection in the passenger cabin and greater driving comfort.