Gloucester Engineering

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Have you heard about Gloucester Engineering? It Has changed leaders and is now ran by somebody else. I surely hope they continue to have the same support and service they have shown over the years. Their Extrusion lines are the best equipment available on the market. I suppose I am showing favoritism for the company; however I have used this extrusion company for many years and they are very helpful, knowledgeable, and their service is reliable and the you can always count on them to go the extra mile to support their customers. Not only is the blown film manufacturer back using their old name, but under new ownership as well. The new website shows the new products available in foam extrusion, stretch film secondary equipment laminating extruders I look forward to doing business with them in the future.

Electrical Circuits

We talked about Hydraulic symbols now lets talk electrical symbols. I find it very handy to review these symbols before I start to read a schematic. Any electrical work being done requires being able to read schematic before you can trouble shoot a piece of equipment. ( You Tube ) is a great tool to use to review these symbols. You can watch these videos over and over again until you get them right. They show you how to draw a circuit and what each symbol means.Wiki is also very valuable it gives you a definition of what the symbol is and how it is used in the circuit. All production equipment machines all have an electrical schematics to show you how to find the area of work being done.

Hydraulic symbols

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Good morning, just wanted to let you know that it's a good idea to refresh yourself with the hydraulic symbols in your blueprint for the injection molding machine your about to work on. Nissei, Van -Dorn, and many others provide prints for each machine. Thermoformers like Irwin, Brown, also provide detailed blueprints for any maintenance work being done. Troubleshooting problem's with cycle times for delayed reaction due to hydraulic issues will be easier when you understand how they work; know adjustment range before changing any control valve setting.

Laminating Foam Sheet

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Sometimes it is hard to troubleshoot lam adhering to the foam sheet, for instance when you have bubbles within the sheet it is suggested that you have to much heat and your over heating it. Then when you have wrinkles you are under heating the sheet. The laminating rollers on the machine could be dirty low on fluids or the nip pressure could be to high. Again I was asked what is a good temperature setting for the laminating cylinder? Suggesting your using 60/40 virgin/regrind foam resin, @ .55 thousands, and around .003 thousands high impact polystyrene you have good gauge control I would run top roller @ 160/180 degrees with a bottom temp. @ 45 degress with a line speed of 125 fpm. let me know if this is any help.

New Gear box Install

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New direct drive gear box install for Gloucester series 200 extruder 24:1 4.5 " 200hp water cooled; we had a hard time removing the old gear box due to no head room so we had to use small air bags to lift box and roll it back enough to lift on to the fork truck. Always return old gear box for the core charge as it is usually very expensive. Gloucester makes it fairly easy in install new boxes as long as you remember to bore scope the barrel and line up the new box to the old barrel. You should never be more than .003 thousands out of alignment the entire length of the barrel. Make sure you install the heat exchanger with 5 micron water filters before the box with bypass so you can change out new ones. Use only the recommended oils for the new gear box due to the fact that the wrong oil will knock out the new seals right away.

Father's Day

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Hello everyone, I normally don't write to much about my personal life, but my son is away in Iraq serving his country, and my daughters called me Friday asking me to come down there to visit on Father's Day. I jumped to the invitation because I haven't seen them or my Grandaughter's Trinite, age 5 and Emilie age 4 in a matter of years. Boy, was I Asiatic I loved seeing them they are so precious. I just got my bike a Harley-Davidson Ironhead Motorcycle running again and I made the 130 mile ride down there in under 2 1/2 hours. I even got to take each girl on a short ride in the Church parking lot they loved it! I will post some pictures if you'd like to see'em here shortly I hope everyone got to see Friends and family this weekend, and God bless our troop's!

Working with Advertising

I find it very difficult to find the right companies to advertise with. It seems that many have very few online support systems that are user friendly; a lot of the help sections are poorly written and when trying to access the live support teams you get another email section or support forum. That's why I like to deal with high ranking companies who have a reputation of success. The customer support is always live and easy to deal with. American companies who speak English, and are easy to understand. New company start up; being inexperienced makes it hard to find the right combination of ads, support, price, and integrity. As always you learn by trial and error, and this can cause delays it production, sales, satisfaction for your customers. I suggest researching as much information as you can before signing up with a company you know nothing about this will lead to a lot of stress and will slow your company down before it gets started.

Website update

Hey everyone, I finally got my website up and running and it looks great! Now all I have to do is get some more content to add. I could use some input from you with information on the designs of foam products. The different kinds of blowing agents that are being used out there for different types of cups,plates and bowls. How does the blowing agent affect the cell structure? What size cell's are you producing? Things like that would be very helpful. Also what type thermoformers are you using? What are the cycle times, and the efficiency of production thank you for your time.

The NPE Show

Good morning, Unable to attend the NPE expo this year and would like some feed back on how it went. All the new equipment, the companies that attended, anything worth writing about I really would appreciate it. Following along at plastics news and it seems that it will be a good show, Also later today I'm going out to get one of those new square cups to check out and see for myself how they look and feel the way they sit and are they comfortable to hold in your hand? Will get back with y'all later and discuss this issues.

Find plastics bloggers

Hello again just wanted to find anyone that's blogging with the same categories as I am, it would be nice to get to know some of you and trade ideas and information on the way the plastics world is going today. I also want to review the new plastics cups that are on the market now, I understand that there is some new designs out there and which ones are selling. If you can give me any help in this matter I will be grateful, I heard that one manufacturing company came out with a square cup now this changed the whole way cups are made. They have made round cups for almost 50 years; now they changed them? What do you think of this new wave?