Plastics News Show Daily - April 5, 2012 - (Page 18)

18 PLASTICS NEWS, April 5, 2012 Steer develops a shear-sensitive screw India company has patent pending on self-wiping, eco-friendly design By Steve Toloken PLASTICS NEWS STAFF ORLANDO, FLA. — Sometimes “green” comes colored metallic silver. At NPE, India’s Steer Engineering Pvt. Ltd. (Booth 5762) introduced a new design for a metal screw element for its extruders that it believes can significantly expand applications for ecofriendly, bio-based materials and other shear-sensitive applications. Steer, based in Bangalore, India, said it has developed a patentpending design that makes the screws self-wiping, reducing the stagnation or degradation of those materials that can happen in a more traditional screw design. ‘This to me is a game changer, a path-breaking introduction.’ Babu Padmanabhan Steer Engineering “This to me is a game changer, a path-breaking introduction,” said Babu Padmanabhan, chief knowledge officer. “This is the first time someone could come up with a mixing element that wipes itself clean.” The company is using the NPE show to talk about the new technology, called Dynamic-Stir, and see what kind of ideas the engineers walking the aisles might have for it. Steer has some ideas about where the technology could fit, such as bio-based or renewably sourced materials. It also may work well with PVC, which traditionally has not worked as well with co-rotating twin-screw designs, said Padmanabhan. “That would be very true for all fillers with sensitivity, particularly sensitivity to heat,” said Wayne Stagner, president and CEO of Steer America Inc., the company’s U.S. subsidiary in Uniontown, Ohio. “This principle enables us to do very uniform and complete mixing with the minimum addition of heat energy.” The design may also have applications with metallocenes, although the company has not done enough research to say for Everything’s illuminated: Babu Padmanabhan, Steer Engineering Pvt. Ltd. chief knowledge officer, shines a light on the firm’s new extruder screw design, dubbed Dynamic-Stir, during NPE2012. certain, Padmanabhan said. “People are not typically able to get [metallocenes] to extrude but we need to document that before we can talk about it,” he said. He said the new screw design is currently only offered on its Omega series of twin-screw lines. He compared it to Intel designing a computer chip, where its engineers design something with faster processing power but can’t anticipate how the chip would be used in new products. “That’s one of the reasons we’ve invested so much in the Steer America facility,” he said. “We have these machines available for use. We encourage applications to be developed.” Corma Inc. invites you to stop by Booth #3571, West Hall Level 2 at NPE2012: The International Plastics Showcase. Register today with our compliments and join us April 1-5 at the Orange County Convention Centre in Orlando, Florida. To register visit: www.npe2012guest.org/?e=874 Corrugated Plastic Pipe Machinery 10 McCleary Court Concord (Toronto) Ontario, Canada L4K 2Z3 tel: (905) 669-9397 fax: (905) 738-4744 e-mail: info@corma.com www.corma.com Plastics News photo by Steve Toloken  http://www.npe2012guest.org/?e=874 http://www.corma.com http://www.corma.com

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Plastics News Show Daily - April 5, 2012

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