Extrusion International 3-2022

30 Extrusion International 3/2022 INDUSTRY NEWS  BB Engineering has been shortlisted for the prestigious Plastics Recycling Awards Europe 2022 for the category Recycling Machinery Innovation with its PET recycling line VacuFil® Visco+ for fber-to-fber inline recycling. “We are still a recycling newcomer and are therefore particularly proud that our technology has already con- vinced so far that we are now among the fnalists. Our origin lies in extru - sion, fltration and spinning tech - nology. We have incorporated our decades of know-how in these felds into the development of our VacuFil ® Visco+ process. We have succeeded in developing a fber-to-fber recycling process that produces high-quality rPET yarn. Being named a fnalist is already a great achievement for us.” said Mr. Matthias Schmitz, Head of Engineering Recycling Technology. BB Engineering GmbH (BBE) is a Ger- man machine building company founded in 1997 as a joint venture between Oerlikon Barmag, a subsid- iary of Oerlikon Textile GmbH & Co. KG, and Brückner Group GmbH. To- day, the company employs more than 160 members of staff at its location in Remscheid, Germany. BBE is the exclu- sive supplier of its mother companies for extrusion systems, melt fltration technology, recycling technology (VacuFil® Visco+), compact spinning technology (VarioFil®) and air-textur- ized yarn (ATY) technology. Beyond that, the entire portfolio is offered to third parties within the plastics and textile industry. The process presented as part of the award is the combinedVacuFil®Visco+ with VarioFil®. This machinery enables the textile industry to perform closed- loop inline recycling of post-consumer polyester (PET) textile waste. The given recycling technology is a thermo-me- chanical recycling process optimized for the textile industry. Key component here is the liquid state polycondensa- tion reactor, known as Visco+, to ad- just the intrin- sic viscosity. Compared to existing fber recycling processes, which address rather less demanding textile applica- tions and don’t include subsequent spinning, BBE’s solution is a whole-in- one process that enables the textile industry to perform closed-loop inline recycling of post-consumer PET fber waste even into high-tech textile yarns with low dpf-values. The Plastics Recycling Awards Europe 2022 winners will be announced on 23 June, during the second day of the Plastics Recycling Show Europe taking place at the RAI Amsterdam. Open to organisations and individu- als across Europe who are involved in the recycling of plastic materials, the Plastics Recycling Awards Europe are organised jointly by Plastics Recyclers Europe (PRE) and Crain Communica- tions, organisers of the Plastics Recy- cling Show Europe. www.prseventeurope.com BB Engineering GmbH www.bbeng.de Plastics Recycling Awards Europe Matthias Schmitz, Head of Engineering Recycling Technology 3D Rendering of VacuFil ® Visco+ for fiber-to-fiber inline recycling  Polyplastics Group has introduced a new series of engineering plastic fne powders which are compatible with a broad range of manufacturing meth- ods. The company has expanded its lineup with DURAST™ Powders which go beyond traditional injection mold- ing and extrusion and are targeted for low-volume production of complex parts utilizing sinter forming, com- pression molding, and 3D printing. DURAST™ Powders made of poly- acetal (POM), polyphenylene sulfde (PPS), polybutylene terephthalate (PBT), and liquid crystalline polymer (LCP) have a unique spherical shape andarecontrolledforfne,narrowpar - ticle size distribution (10 μm-200 μm). Engineering plastics in powder form permit the use of manufacturing methods that were previously im- possible with pellet shapes, making it possible to impart the strengths of engineering plastics and additional performance attributes. Polyplastics developed these fne powders af - ter extensive research and testing of powder manufacturing methods. Polyplastics was successful in powder- ing a POM with a low glass transition temperature. Moreover, modifed DURAST™ POM exhibits slow crystal- lization and is useful for 3D printing. It also has low warpage in SLS models New Engineering Plastic Fine Powders (Source: Polyplastics Co., Ltd.)