The Stratos company of Fiorano Modenese, which Mectiles thanks for its trust and collaboration, has just purchased the new mat line, putting the plant immediately into operation with excellent results
The ceramic market is changing and Mectiles Italia keeps up with the times and, for this reason, has invented a new line of mating. Today, the demand for large slabs with increasingly thin thicknesses is strong. This is a paradox, as larger and thinner slabs would normally also be less resistant than taller ones.
It is therefore on this point where Mectiles Italia can make the difference compared to competitors, thanks to its revolutionary mat line that provides for the safety of large thin slabs, a solution as innovative as revolutionary that avoids not only possible breakage but also a simple detachment of pieces that could be dangerous for people and things, as well as damaging the product itself.
Mectiles Italia has designed its own mat line called “Ecogreen”, which can be customized according to the production needs and the spaces available to the customer.
The production cycle is completely automated and digitized, in compliance with industry 4.0 regulations for all machines and the general panel, and consists of a loading portal, a polyurethane application area, a mat, a catalyzing area, and the unloading portal on a case or frame.
The supports of the sheets are stretcher supports, with a patented flat recirculation system, able to eliminate the use of paper and plastics from the production process for the protection of the product, to make the operators’ workplace cleaner and safer, avoiding possible damage to the finished product and reducing costs.
Going further into the specifics, the innovative Mectiles Italia masking system does not involve the use of air spraying systems with cabin, so much so that it eliminates the problem of overspray, thus making the work area cleaner for operators, with relative advantages from a health point of view. These processes improve the performance of the machine also in terms of the duration of the plant itself, as well as requiring less maintenance, with the number of hours dedicated to cleaning reduced to a minimum, to allow considerable savings also in economic terms.
To further increase the quality and ductility of the Mectiles Italia system there is also a solution to the problem of space, as the new mat line can be contained in rooms with a decidedly lower capacity than in the past.
The elimination of over-spray and environmental pollution in the workplace, when applying liquid polyurethane on the surface of the sheet, also improves the protection of the surface of the sheet. At the same time, it keeps the application areas, the conveyor line, and the application machines cleaner. Among other things, the polyurethane-isocyanate pre-mixing phase was also improved with a new system compared to the existing ones.
All this process, therefore, avoids paper residues or non-recyclable plastics that, in traditional processes, would have contaminated the polyurethane intended to protect the sheets. Moreover, thanks to the innovative patented system of turning flat stretchers on the mat line, the subsequent drying phase is also optimized through a new bidirectional air recirculation system aimed at making the process more uniform and constant.
In practice, summarizing the salient points of the revolutionary masking process proposed by Mectiles Italia, the line to make more solid and made large ceramic slabs, thinner than in the past, is developed on carousel layout with significant space reductions; moreover, the Barella slab supports have a patented flat recirculation system, while the application of polyurethane takes place at medium pressure with mixer and high-efficiency comb, without the protection of paper and plastic, and then get to the next drying phase with a bidirectional system to have a greater uniformity of the process. Digitized programs can be customized for polyurethane machines and roller press machines for fixing the mat.
The Stratos company of Fiorano Modenese, which Mectiles Italia thanks for the trust and the collaboration, has just purchased the plant and put it immediately into operation with excellent results.