Slitting rolls - Slitting Service - Customer-specific orders
Our slitting department is equipped with a wide range of slitting machines. Various slitting techniques are used depending on the material, roll length, cutting width and quantity. For products supplied by the customer, a preliminary cutting test is recommended. We have many years of experience in processing standard materials (e.g. polyester films, Kapton films, glass fabrics and Nomex papers).
In the production and processing of materials in continuous sheets, cutting is at the end of the value creation chain. It is very often a case of reducing large rolls (jumbo rolls, master rolls) from the coating process to smaller formats (pre-cutting). In addition, so-called log rolls (large width, short running length) can be prepared as a production stage before cutting. The last stage is the production of rolls cut to the size required by the customer of almost any width (steps of 1/10 mm) or further processing of punched parts.
Conditions for contract work
- The cutting width can often be between (1 mm) 3 mm and 1,500 mm in steps of 1/10 mm.
- The roll length can be between 5 m and 2,500 m (maximum external diameter)
- Standard tolerance +-0.2 mm (if required, greater precision is possible)
- The film thickness must be in the range 0.012 - approx. 0.500 mm (or up to 3 mm, depending on the material).
Cutting off
The log rolls (large width rolls already cut to the correct length of e.g. 66 m) are placed on a rotating axis and cut to the required width by a rotating blade that cuts in tangentially. Displacement by the blade material as it cuts in and the unavoidable heating as a result of friction (cooling e.g. with water) place limits on the process.
However, the large degree of flexibility and very quick adjustment to the individual cutting width, which is important if customer orders change frequently, are advantageous. It is therefore likely that this technology will be used even more widely in future in view of the need to adapt better to customer requirements.
Roll slitting
This process is the classical type of cutting used in the film processing industry. Here you work from one roll onto another, in other words you unwind the material and feed it through a rotating set of blades (scissor cut). The individual, cut rolls are then wound up again on two separate axes alternately. The scissor cut can cause deformation on the edge of metal foils, for example (material displacement).
However, this effect can be counteracted by using special sets of blades. The roll slitting process (also known as sleeve cutting or rewind cutting) is usually used if large quantities of rolls of a standard width must be produced.
Formatting
Not cutting in the sense of the processes described above. Rather, the very long jumbo rolls, for example, are reduced to shorter lengths by cutting at right angles to the direction of the continuous sheet. In format cutting, the continuous rolls of the product are given a customised format (sheets) and are not wound up again. Format cutting therefore represents the transition to production of individually shaped punched parts and labels.
The maximum format size is 2,500 x 2,000 mm with small tolerance (larger formats in request). Of course, smaller formats are also possible.
Lamination
Various products can also be combined by lamination during formatting or independently in advance. In some cases, the laminators used are specially designed for lamination of very thin films in the single-digit micron range (>6 µm depending on the strength of the material).
The technology used for this is very complex, in order to produce the laminates without distortion.