Steelastic has built a calenderless manufacturing cell in its Akron, US facility to enable tire manufacturers to test run their own materials for tire reinforcement components. The company’s extrusion-based manufacturing processes for belt/breaker, body ply, cap strip and innerliner eliminate the need for expensive and inflexible calendering and off-line processing equipment.
The compact, single-operator machines used in this cell have been developed in response to a growing demand for more flexible, highly automated and lower capital outlay manufacturing systems. “This dedicated manufacturing cell is a key component of our drive to help manufacturers worldwide convert to more versatile, smaller footprint systems, necessary to profitably manufacture shorter runs of multiple tire types,” said Ian Dennis, president of Steelastic.
“It has been a busy year to date, with numerous successful trials completed. Manufacturers send us small batches of their own materials to be manufactured to agreed specifications on our belt/breaker, body ply and cap strip systems. The material is then packed and shipped to the tire manufacture for tire-building, testing and validation in their own plants.”
Steelastic is now scheduling trials for the remainder of 2019 and early 2020 in its calenderless manufacturing cell.
