Caps and closures in the Middle East
At the Saudi Plastics and Petrochem trade fair, January 18-21, 2016 in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, the exhibits and demonstrations of the Austrian machine builder Engel will revolve around the manufacture of bottle caps, thin-walled packaging, pallets and fittings, as well as consumables for medical and laboratory use.
The company works with system partners and three of them will be joining Engel in Riyadh, namely Otto Hofstetter (mould maker), ifw (mould maker) and Beck automation (IML applications).
The partners possess many years of experience and have completed many projects in the Middle East together, particularly in the areas of caps and closures, thin-walled packaging, fittings and pallets.
The caps and closures market in the Middle East is extremely dynamic. In 2010, Engel presented a high-speed all-electric machine specifically tailored to the requirements of the caps and closures industry based on the technology of the e-cap machines. The e-cap offers cycle times of less than three seconds and injection speeds of up to 460 mm per second whilst energy and cooling water consumption has been optimised. "Energy efficiency is becoming extremely important in Saudi Arabia," as Andreas Leitner, Sales Director Middle East, says. "With subsidies being reduced, electricity is going to become considerably more expensive in the next few years."
Engel e-cap machines are also able to process non-free-flowing types of HDPE to guarantee low unit costs even in the manufacture of lightweight closures.
