A sticker for spacing wood is extruded from an alloy that includes polycarbonate resin and polysulfone resin. The sticker can have a variety of different configurations, including a top surface that includes contact points that have an area substantially smaller than the area of the top surface, a single or multiple internal longitudinal hallow chambers separated by multiple reinforcing members, longitudinal external grooves that allow airflow, lateral external grooves that intersect the longitudinal external grooves, curved sides for a version where the stickers are placed manually, and substantially straight sides for a version where the stickers are placed by a machine. A method for manufacturing the sticker includes pulling an extrusion with a puller that includes a plurality of teeth that provide a first plurality of lateral grooves running substantially perpendicular to a longitudinal axis of the extrusion in a top and bottom surface of the extrusion.

The invention relates to a device and a method for calibrating a blown film (6), said device comprising: a tubular region with at least one inner wall (55), through which region the blown film can be passed; a liquid reservoir (82), which can be used to provide a liquid and which is situated above the tubular region, the liquid being guidable between the inner wall (55) and the blown film; and a suctioning device (B), situated below the tubular region, for suctioning off at least part of the liquid from the blown film. At least one liquid-permeable element (92) is provided, said element surrounding at least parts of the periphery of the blown film (6). This device permits the distance of the liquid-permeable element from the main axis of the blown film to be altered.

The invention relates to a method for the extrusion and labelling of a packaging tube (14), comprising the following successive steps performed on an extrusion-labelling line, namely: a) forming a partially or fully tubular label (17) from a film (12); b) introducing the label (17) into a calibration element (22); c) extruding a tubular body (13) on the side of the concave surface of the label (17); d) bringing the external surface of the tubular body (13) into contact with the concave surface of the label (17), step (c) being performed in the calibration element (22). The invention also relates to an extrusion-labelling device and a packaging tube.

A calibration device for the extrusion of profiles from plastics is provided. The calibration device comprises at least one tank calibrator with an opening and a running surface for the extruded profile, which can be arranged in a vacuum tank with cooling water and via whose outer surface the heat of the extruded profile can at least partly be transferred to the cooling water. The at least one tank calibrator includes at least one cooling channel for cooling the running surfaces and the axial length of the tank calibrator at least corresponds to the height and/or the width of the nominal dimension of the profile.

A polyetheretherketone pipe of length greater than 250 meters and a residual stress of less than 5 MPa may be made using a calibrator device 2 which includes a cone shaped opening 6 arranged to receive a molten extruded pipe shaped polymer. Attached to the front member 4 is a vacuum plate 14a and successive vacuum plates 14b-14h are attached to one another to define an array of vacuum plates, the vacuum plates being arranged to allow a vacuum to be applied to a pipe precursor passing through opening 16. The vacuum plates 14 also include temperature control means for heating or cooling the plates and therefore heating or cooling a pipe precursor passing through the openings. With a vacuum applied to opening 6, 16 and heating/cooling the plates, an extruded hot plastics pipe is inserted into calibrator 2 via opening 6 and conveyed through opening 16 in plates 14, whereupon it is urged by the vacuum against the cylindrical surface defined by plates 14 to maintain its shape and the temperature of each plate is controlled to control the rate of cooling of the pipe precursor passing through. The pipe may be cooled at a relatively slow rate so that a pipe made from a relatively fast crystallising polymer crystalises and the crystallinity of the pipe along its extent and throughout its thickness is substantially constant.

The invention relates to a calibration device (1) for calibrating a blown film (6), said device comprising; a tubular region (55) with at least one inner wall (92), through which region the blown film (6) can be passed; a liquid reservoir which provides a liquid and which is situated above the tubular region (55); an inlet region, in which the liquid can be introduced into the space between the outer wall of the blown film (6) and the inner wall (92) of the tubular region (55); and a scraper device (117), situated below the tubular region (55), by means of which scraper device at least part of the liquid can be removed from the outer surface. The distance of the liquid-removing regions of the scraper device (117) from the main axis of the blown film (6) can be altered.

Apparatus and methods for manufacturing compostable, biodegradable drink straws from polyhydroxyalkanoate (PHA) material are disclosed herein. Such apparatus may include a hopper that contains raw PHA material, an extruder that receives the raw PHA material from the hopper and produces extruded PHA material, one or more waters baths that cool the extruded PHA material, a puller that pulls a tubular stream of PHA material through the system, and a cutter that is configured to cut the stream of PHA material into finished straws. The finished straws may be soil- and marine-biodegradable, as well as home- and industrial-compostable.

The present invention relates to a seal device for a negative pressure calibrating unit in a extrusion line for producing profiled plastic sections, in particular pipes whereby the inner face of a seal rests against the circumference of the extruded profiled section in a formfitting manner and the seal is radially supported on the profiled section in order to apply a sealing force. It is the object of the invention to provide another similar device which is very easily constructed and can be produced inexpensively. This task is solved in that the seal is a porous and elastic foam body (13), the surfaces (17, 19) of that are exposed to the atmosphere are coated with an air-tight coating (21).

In an embodiment, the present invention provides a method for increasing the cooling performance of an extrusion line and for extruding a plastics profile, in particular a plastics tube, in an energy efficient manner, the method including the steps of: melting plastics material in an extruder; shaping a plastics strand and feeding the plastics strand to a die; shaping a plastics profile using the die; and calibrating and curing by cooling the profile in a cooling and/or calibration device, a gaseous medium being drawn through one or more cooling tanks in order to cool the outside of the profile. A temperature and a saturation of the gaseous medium is increased between an inlet region and an outlet region for the gaseous medium. A liquid medium is added between the inlet region and the outlet region using spray nozzles.

A method for measuring a tubular strand exiting from an extrusion device comprises directing electromagnetic radiation from an inside of the tubular strand to an inner side of a tubular strand. The electromagnet radiation is radiated from at least one radiation source within a frequency range from 1 GHz to 6000 GHz. The electromagnetic radiation is reflected off of the tubular strand and received by at least one radiation receiver. A value for at least one of a diameter, a wall thickness, and a deviation in shape of the tubular strand is determined from the electromagnetic radiation received by at least one radiation receiver.