(pressebox) Loßburg, 27.03.2009, Year after year, the Arburg Technology Days provide an important opportunity for members of the international plastics industry to meet. The fact that over 4,000 guests from 48 different countries made their way to Lossburg despite the current difficulties in the economic situation once again proves the attractiveness of this event. This is where international visitors are granted a unique opportunity to find out about future trends in the injection moulding industry and the complete Arburg product and service spectrum, as well as witnessing the debuts of new products.
The mood at the 2009 Technology Days event was extremely positive and the over 4,000 international visitors were very impressed with Arburg and full of praise for its range of products and services. This year, the largest contingent of foreign visitors came from Switzerland, with 173 guests, followed by France with 111. There were 93 visitors from Poland and the US contingent amounted to 64 customers and interested parties. People were even willing to make the long trek from North and South America, Asia and Australia to attend the traditional Arburg event and to find out more about the latest trends in injection moulding technology.
Every aspect of automation covered
This included the Automation area for which numerous production cells were once again exhibited this year. Visitors could see how downstream processing steps were integrated, how stamped parts were supplied from the belt (reel-to-reel process), or how part handling worked with a six-axes robot, whose complex processes could be programmed in a transparent way using the Selogica interface implemented in the robot’s control system. Two Golden Edition Allrounders with Multilift V Select were used to demonstrate exactly how an Arburg robotic system can be programmed easily and safely by means of the Teach-in function.
Premiers for several new machines
Energy efficiency is another key topic that is gaining increasing importance in the injection moulding industry. Appropriately, Arburg presented two new sizes of its Alldrive electric machine series at the Technology Days event. This series is greatly expanded by the small Allrounder 270 A with a clamping force of 350 kN and the large Allrounder 720 A with a clamping force of 3,200 kN.
In addition, a completely new series was presented in the form of the Allrounder H (Hidrive) models. These are high performance injection moulding machines with energy-efficient drive technology for thermoplastic processing with a reduced cycle time. The new Hidrive machines are particularly characterised by the powerful combination of familiar electrical and hydraulic machine technology. Allrounders 470 H and 570 H were presented as representatives of the new series, featuring clamping forces ranging from 600 to 3,200 kN. The exhibits offered impressive proof of their capabilities with applications from the areas of packaging and technical injection moulding.
Customer Centre with more than 30 exhibits
The centre-piece of the 2009 Technology Days was the new Arburg Customer Centre, which was opened immediately prior to the event. The aim of the centre is to further improve customer support and to present Arburg injection moulding technology and the entire product spectrum in an appropriate way. The Technology Days offered ample proof that the new 2,100 square metre premises meet these requirements to perfection: more than 30 exhibits with a very broad range of applications demonstrated the performance and versatility of the Allrounders.
All series and numerous applications presented on a central basis
All Allrounder series were presented here, including horizontal and vertical machine concepts, the entire clamping force range from 125 kN to 5,000 kN, various automation solutions and lots more besides. The broad range of applications included thermoset and LSR processing, Exjection®, medical technology, multi-component injection moulding, micro injection moulding, natural fibre processing, precision injection moulding, powder injection moulding (PIM), the production of optical parts in the clean room, sandwich injection moulding, high-speed thin-wall items, tandem technology, technical injection moulding and encapsulation of inserts.
Thanks to the rooms integrated in the Customer Centre for power injection moulding, clean room and production technology, visitors were also made aware of areas where Arburg has long been active and of the corresponding products in the range.
The new, fully functional clean room allows prototyping to be carried out under logged clean room conditions. The Allrounder can either be fully installed within the clean room itself, or can be connected to the clean room. The Production Technology area contains everything relating to production planning, control, monitoring and documentation, such as the Arburg host computer system (ALS) or Arburg Quality Control (AQC).
Presentation of the service area
Arburg’s extensive service spectrum was presented in a service area specially established for the Technology Days. The main focus here lay on the extensive training programme, preventive maintenance and, most significantly, Arburg’s international service.
Specialist presentations proved to be real crowd pullers
One of the keys to the success of the Technology Days event is the successful mix of theoretical explanations and practical demonstrations. With audiences of around 1,750, this year’s five German and English specialist presentations were once again very well attended, proving that by choosing to focus on energy efficiency we had again correctly judged the key issue of concern to visitors. For example, the internal and external experts offered an overview of how costs can be reduced through needs-based injection moulding technology, improved production processes, intelligent energy management and optimised building technology.
An exciting glimpse behind the scenes at Arburg
Efficient use of energy has always played a key role at Arburg. Visitors had an opportunity to see the innovative approaches adopted by the company in its new building during a series of explanatory technical tours. Many guests took this unique chance to take a look behind the scenes of the energy efficient building concept and management system. As they made the long trip around the facility, the majority of visitors also took the time to follow the general guided tours that offered a detailed insight into production at Arburg.Über ARBURG GmbH + Co KG
Arburg, a German machine construction company, is one of the leading global manufacturers of injection moulding machines for plastics processing with clamping forces between 125 kN and 5,000 kN. Fields of application include the production of plastic parts for motor vehicles, communications and consumer electronics, medical technology, domestic appliances and packaging. The product range is completed by robotic systems, complex projects and other peripherals. Arburg’s operations are coordinated by an integrated management system and are DIN EN ISO 9001 and 14001 certified. Arburg is represented by its own organisations in 24 countries at 32 locations and by trading partners in more than 50 countries. However, production takes place exclusively in the parent factory in Lossburg (Germany) – with the mark of quality “made by Arburg – made in Germany”. From a total of more than 2,000 Arburg employees, around 1,700 work in Germany. Around 330 further employees work at the 23 subsidiaries and representative offices.
Further information about Arburg can be found at www.arburg.com
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