|  | Breakthrough lighter weight heavy duty bags now possible with ExxonMobil Chemical's metallocene PE technology
| | | Heavy duty bags can be made thinner and lighter yet be just as strong!
That's good news for manufacturers, heavy duty bag makers and others in the packaging industry who can shave off as much as 15% on raw material costs via these thinner, lighter weight bags. (Not forgetting the additional savings on storage and transportation costs resulting from the reduced weight).
The breakthrough 125 micron heavy duty bag film was pioneered by ExxonMobil Chemical. To date, the industry's prevailing thickness standard for heavy duty bag films in Asia Pacific is +/-140 microns.
"This breakthrough lighter weight heavy duty bag film not only cut costs for manufacturers and businesses, but offers more sustainable packaging solutions so imperative in today's challenging market environment", stressed David McConville, ExxonMobil Chemical's Global PE Market Development Manager.
Heng Kok Siong, ExxonMobil Applications Technology Manager, explained the heavy duty bag downgauging challenge "To downgauge from a heavy duty bag film of about 140 microns to 125 microns may not appear significant, but it is a huge challenge because the stringent requirements of high stiffness, creep resistance, and drop test performance for the heavy duty bags, counteract one another."
"But with the introduction of our new Enable™ mPE resins last year," he added, "and using a special blend of Enable™ mPE and Exceed™ mPE resins, we've achieved a 125 micron heavy duty bag film that provides an excellent balance of high stiffness, creep resistance and toughness. The long chain branching in Enable™ mPE significantly improves bubble stability during the film blowing process which, in turn, can improve film line output by more than 10% with excellent gauge control"
After several months of intensive testing and trials to confirm the film's performance, ExxonMobil has switched completely to using 125 micron film as the standard for all its 25 kg resin bags produced at its Singapore plant. Several of its customers have also converted to using the thinner high performance film.
One such customer is Nordenia, a manufacturer in the industrial and consumer packaging business in Malaysia. Norman Lee, general manager of Nordenia, reported that since switching to the 125 micron film formulation using Enable™ mPE and Exceed™ mPE, they have seen smoother and improved film processing operation. "We are pleased that the film run using this formulation is very stable, with excellent bubble stability and less gels in the blown bubble, which means less material wastage," he explained. Lee also shared that they have seen lower machine downtime and increased output of 6-7% -- "a level we've not even optimized as yet because of under-performing machine parts that need to be replaced," he revealed.
"We were initially unsure of the technical performance of a thinner film, but after we ran the formulation, we were convinced. The transition to the formulation was seamless, with only minor adjustments needed to our machines. We've not encountered any performance issues with the thinner film," he added.
The 125 micron heavy duty bag is suitable for bagging a broad range of products, including granular free flowing materials, pet food, animal feed, fertilizers, herbicides, pesticides, lawn and garden products, rice, salt, sugar and flour.
For more technical information on the 125 micron film and its applications, please contact the expert in ExxonMobil Chemical -- Heng Kok Siong at 65-68858314, e-mail: koksiong.heng@exxonmobil.com.
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