EconCore chooses MEAF 50-H34 extruder for rPET honeycomb sandwich panels

Belgian company EconCore has chosen the high-speed, energy efficient MEAF 50-H34 extruder for its trial production of rPET ThermHex honeycomb sandwich panels.

The rPET honeycomb core is made from 95 per cent post-consumer PET from bottles, combining sustainability with mechanical performance, and the technology will be shown of the MEAF stand at K 2019.

Wouter Winant, Technical Manager at EconCore, said: “We want to bring a smart, innovative, and sustainable product to market that contributes towards the circular economy of plastics.”

“Our rPET core offers high stiffness and strength in compression and shear, high temperature stability, and has excellent weight to cost ration.”

“In addition to the CO2 reduction because of the use of recycled material, the rPET honeycomb core further reduces the CO2 footprint thanks to the lower weight of manufactured parts.”

“Of course this needs to be produced in a cost-effective way, for which we have chosen the MEAF 50-H34 extruder, as an economical but highly efficient flat die extruder at the start of the production process.”

Ardjan Houtekamer, Technical Director at MEAF, said: “With their high throughputs, extruding up to 1,200kg per hour while only using 0.2 kWh per kg, the sheet extruders of this series are among the most efficient in the market.”

“Our extrusion lines are ideally suited for both single and multi-layer extrusion applications and can produce up to eight layers, using a range of materials including PP, PS, HIPS, PET, PE, PA, PLA, TPE, EVOH barrier, and others.”