Leistritz

A new “dual-purpose” twin screw extruder system has been introduced by Leistritz for use in wide ranging color and related dispersive mixing applications.The system includes either a ZSE-18, ZSE-27 or ZSE-40 mm high-speed twin screw extruder with a screw design and process section configured for intensive mixing. A gear pump is attached to the front end to build pressure to drive the melt stream through a fine filtration media, typically 300 to 400 mesh screens, contained in a breaker plate assembly.The Leistritz Macromatex TSCS PC-based control package allows the pressure in front of the screen pack to be tracked in a defined and repeatable way, with the results available and archived in both spreadsheet and graphical formats. Both masterbatch and letdowns can be tested, and the equipment can be configured for medical and pharmaceutical environments.When not utilized for pressure rise testing, the twin screw extruder can be mated with a downstream pelletizing system for concentrate compounding development, just like any twin screw extruder. Pelletizing systems typically do not use the gear pump attachment, unless very fine filtration is required. A gear pump is more commonly integrated with sheet/film/profile/fiber applications. All of these products can be extruded with the “dual-purpose” twin screw extruder system.