15 December 2009, Obertshausen - Karl Mayer’s says its RSE
4-1 is definitely the fastest four-bar raschel machine in the world, and will
soon have even more accolades heaped upon it. The machine will be re-launched
in April 2010 as the most reliable machine in its series and will set new speed
standards and operate with a high degree of accuracy, completely independently
of climatic conditions.
The RSE 4-1’s speed has been increased by integrating
innovative carbon fibre reinforced plastic (CFRP) components into the machine
construction, which has been specially adapted to handle these components. Karl
Mayer says this is a technological quantum leap forward, which has already
enabled some of the other high-speed warp knitting machines produced by the
company to be operated extremely successfully by the company’s clients.
The RSE 4-1 is the first raschel machine to be equipped with
the CFRP components. All the bars on the machine for processing stretch fabrics
have been manufactured from the lightweight, stable material. The entire
machine, from the needles to the basic machine design, has been modified to
cope with the resulting increase in speed.
The changes that have been made to the needles have focused
on increasing the resistance to lateral distortion, whereas aspects of the
basic machine design were optimised specifically in terms of the machine
dynamics. The modifications that were made to improve the stability, both of
the bars as well as the basic machine, were made by carrying out detailed and
extensive calculations using tried-and-tested procedures, such as the finite
element method and multi-body simulation systems. Karl Mayer says nothing was
left to chance and this can be seen quite clearly from the results of these
technical improvements.
The weight of the CFRP bars has been decreased by as much as
25% compared with the conventional type, whilst the rigidity has been
increased. This has opened up more scope for setting the maximum achievable
speed. Above all, however, the use of CFRP materials results in exceptional
temperature stability during production. The temperature window for problem-free
machine running has been extended from +/- 2°C
to +/- 7°C. Extending this
tolerance range has minimised any loss in efficiency caused by having to adjust
the needle tool as a function of the climatic conditions, or to reduce the
speed following a machine stoppage. The result is that the machine availability
of the RSE 4-1 is higher than ever before, which has increased the total
overall performance of this high-tech production machine.
