The manufacturing process are divided into 2 plants operations

Plant 1 and plant 2

Plant 1 operations include the following:

Extrusion process

Weaving process

Laminating process

Reclaiming process

EXTRUSION PROCESS

This is the first stage in the manufacturing process. The inputs (raw materials) for this process are
polypropylene and additive. The output is tape.

The polypropylene used varies by the melt flow ratio and they include

Advanced

Sasol

Eleme

The additives used are of different purposes and they include

Masterbatch: It is applied to give color specified to the customer

Calcium carbonate (CaCO3): It is applied to serves as filler and also give strength to the tapes

Ultraviolet (UV): It is applied to protect the tapes against sunlight that is to stabilize the product against
ozone attacks

Antiblock/Vistamax: It is applied for elasticity purpose

All these materials channeled into a gravitech machine according to the spec requirement of the tape.

GRAVITECH

This is where we have all the raw materials to be used for the tape production and all the raw materials
have their separate compartment. Each of the raw materials goes into the mixer at a specified rate from
the feeder then to the holding tank.

DRYER

The mixture of the raw materials moves from the holding into dryer. The dryer is set at a temperature
between 750C – 900C depending on the moisture content of the materials. And the essence of the dryer
is to remove all moisture content in the raw materials.

HOPPER
The hopper collects the raw materials from the dryer and feed it to the extrusion barrel. A metal
detector is fitted to the hopper to detect and attract metal from going into extrusion barrel

MELT DISCHARGE UNIT (EXTRUSION BARREL)

The extrusion barrel is guided as it makes use of high temperature between 2700C – 280OC. With the aid
of a screw, the materials are crushed and then move to the melting unit and at this point the raw
materials get melted and homogenize.

FILTER

The material pass through the filter in a molten state to prevent any impurity from going into the die
cavity.

DIE HEAD

the materials in molten state come out through the die head. The die lip has screws that can be adjusted
and the adjustment determines how the molten material comes out whether thin or thick.

WATER QUENCH

As the materials in molten state is coming out of the die head, it is cooled immediately as it pours inside
the water tank. The water tank has water in it at a specified temperature. To solidify the molten material.
At this point, film is formed.

TAKE UP AND HOLDING ROLLER

The take up roller are two and as the name implies, they take up the film inside the quench tank from
the first take up roller to the second roller. The film runs off the second roller to the banana roller which
aid in spreading the film for the slitting blade to easily cut through the film at a set spacer width. After
which the slitted films run off the holding rollers to the oven.

OVEN

In the oven, the films are treated at the right temperature to improve on the strength of the tape. The
films are stretched in the oven to obtain the require width of the tape. The tapes pass on to the
stretching roller.

STRETCHING AND ANNEALING UNIT.

The stretching unit and annealing unit work with a stretching ratio to further stretch the tape to require
width. The stretching unit is called the hot rollers because the hot rollers work with high temperature
and such is temperature is only attainable with the use oil while the annealing unit is also called chiller as
it works with a cooling circuit and it maintain a temperature between 20oC – 25oC to cool off the
temperature of the tapes from the hot rollers. The tapes run off these rollers to the winder.

WINDER

This is the unit for winding tapes on the cylindrical cores. It is equipped with guide elements to ensures
smooth and exact feeding of the tapes. The length of tape to be wounded is set from the process
control. Two types of tapes are produced from this unit and the length of tapes(meters) and the type of
the core used determines the type of produced.

We have three types of core

Phenolic

Aluminum core with end cap

Aluminum core without end cap

We have two types of tapes and they differentiated by their size.

Weft tape: The weft tape has a tape length of 14,000m and diameter of 110 – 115mm and the cores
used for this tape are Phenolic core and Aluminum core with end cap.

Warp tape: The warp tape has a tape length of 28,000m and diameter of 140 – 160mm and the core
used for this tape is Aluminum core without end cap.