Displaying items by tag: voith
Official Start of Construction Work on New Voith Training Center
Heidenheim. With a symbolic first cut of the spade, Voith has marked the official start of the construction work of its new Training Center in Heidenheim. Together with the four best Voith apprentices who had also received awards from the Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Dr. Hubert Lienhard, Chairman of the Management Board of Voith GmbH welcomed representatives from politics and business for a celebration at the Ploucquet Areal. Among the guests were Thomas Reinhardt, Chief Administrator of the District of Heidenheim, Bernhard Ilg, Mayor of the city of Heidenheim, Helmut Althammer, President of the East Württemberg's Chamber of Commerce and Industry and Eberhard Faecke, the architect of the new Training Center.
"Only when we build can we develop further, and only where we build are things moved on," said Dr. Lienhard in his speech. "The new building is yet another milestone in the 100-year tradition of apprenticeship schemes at Voith. Time and again has our company provided a fresh impetus to all issues of vocational training for young people." Job training and education are rated highly at Voith. At Heidenheim alone, the company currently trains about 180 young people in 13 different occupations. Worldwide, more than 1,200 apprentices and students are presently honing their career perspectives at Voith.
With a total investment of Euro 16 million for the new Training Center, Voith shows its commitment to the Heidenheim headquarters. The new building is to be opened in late 2013. The new Training Center, designed by the Leinfeld architect Eberhard Faecke, concentrates on transparency, functionality and inspiration. Due to the new location in the immediate vicinity of the company's head office, vocational training and further education are now also "optically" in focus. "With this groundbreaking ceremony, we are starting the construction work for a piece of the future of Voith right at our traditional headquarters. In doing so, we are laying the perfect foundation for the training of future apprentices," stated Dr. Lienhard.
Following the speech of the Voith CEO, Mayor Bernhard Ilg welcomed the guests and praised the concerted and decisive undertaking. "Heidenheim is currently in the public eye, because the town is developing at rapid speed. Never before have we seen so many investors in housing, trade and industry." Ilg expects that the Training Center will also have a positive impact on the town center, which is being further enhanced by projects such as the new library, a health center, a day nursery and a supermarket.
Negotiation Partners Settle for Reconciliation of Interests
In conclusion of their discussions about the restructuring measures at Voith Paper, the chief negotiators of Voith Paper and the relevant Workers' Council Committees have settled for a reconciliation of interests on September 11, 2012.
In May 2012, Voith Paper had announced restructuring measures due to a structurally induced ongoing decline in sales in the field of graphic paper machines.
According to the reconciliation of interests both sides have agreed upon that about 50 jobs less than the initially intended figure will be cut at Voith Paper in Germany and Austria. This is a total of 670 rather than the initial 710. This means that 317 job cuts will affect the location Heidenheim. At the location Ravensburg, 218 jobs will be cut, while Krefeld cuts down on 66 jobs and St. Poelten in Austria on 69 jobs.
Regarding the implementation of these adaptive measures, the negotiation partners have agreed on the following key points:
- It is still the declared goal to introduce all measures in the most socially acceptable way and, wherever possible, avoid forced redundancies. If forced redundancies really are inevitable, they will, at the earliest, come into effect at the end of 2013. This does not affect the existing operational rules in Heidenheim and Krefeld.
- The existing Centers of Competency including Automation at all German Voith Paper locations and in St. Poelten/Austria will remain there until the end of 2015.
- Voith will establish a training corporation at the location Ravensburg. Employees will be offered severance payments, combined with the option of changing into this training corporation.
- The location Ravensburg will continue to operate maintenance and manufacturing services on a small scale.
- The R & D facilities in Ravensburg and Krefeld will remain at their locations.
This concluding settlement paves the way for the reorganization of Voith Paper as of October 1, 2012. The company will provide further information on the results of the reorganization in the next few weeks.
New Revolution press felt developed by Voith
Voith’s newly developed Revolution press felt has now been launched into the market for production of board and packaging paper. With the aid of this innovation, paper production is even more efficient.
Along with increased drying performance, Revolution ensures shorter start-up phases, energy savings and consistent quality characteristics over its entire service life. The key innovation of Revolution is its structure, which has a special polymer layer. Revolution can thus control the flow of water before, during and after passage through the nip. For this reason, it dewaters better and contaminates less. The dry content is higher by up to 2% than with a conventional felt. The self-cleaning effect also helps to ensure the performance of the press felt remains the same over its entire service life.
Paper produced with the aid of Revolution has especially good surface characteristics due to the larger contact surface with the paper or board web. It was confirmed in practical testing that this new press felt allows substantially shorter start-up times. From the beginning, the level of nip dewatering is very high. Revolution thus has a positive effect on the energy balance.
Voith Paper is a division of the Voith Group and the leading partner to and pioneer in the paper industry. Through constant innovations, Voith Paper is optimizing the paper manufacturing process, focusing on developing resource-saving products to reduce the use of energy, water, and fibers.
ProTect: safe and easy press fabric measurements
In order to bring safety to the conduct of press fabric measurements Voith has developed ProTect. This tool allows essential measurements to be carried out but eliminates risks to the operator from working close to rotat-ing parts or walking on slippery surfaces.
ProTect was designed to safeguard operating personnel while giving relia-ble press fabric measurements at various positions in the press section of the paper machine. This new tool is very easy to operate and adapts flexi-bly to different measuring equipment items. ProTect is a safe solution, giv-ing exact and repeatable measurements of the press fabric.
Press fabric measurements are very important to ensure efficient paper production. Measurements need to be taken while the paper machine is running, exposing operators to a number of safety risks. ProTect eliminates these risks. It consists of a self-propelled carriage, fixture and any number of traverse beams. It can be used with all common manual measurement devices. The moving parts of ProTect are predominantly located outside the machine, so wear and additional maintenance outlay are minimized.
I-Series forming fabrics from Voith enjoy worldwide success
The forming fabrics can be used for the production of fine papers to sophisticated packaging papers. The technology ensures very good runability at high speed, best performance, cost-efficient operation in respect of resources and energy consumed, as well as excellent quality.
Voith has upgraded the world’s biggest board machine
After a Voith rebuild, APP’s BM 6 in Xiaogang, China, went back into operation at the beginning of 2012. The goal of the rebuild was to speed up the BM 6 to 1,100 m/min. At this speed range no other multi-ply board machine has ever produced top quality art board products, as now APP does in Xiaogang. APP and Voith have crossed the 4,000 t/24 h production mark and the production speed of 1,100 m/min. This is a new benchmark in the board making history.
The rebuild was a big challenge for the teams of APP and Voith because of the limited shutdown time of eight days. During this short period Voith has modified the wire, press and dryer sections to fulfill APP’s requirements. In the wire section the newly developed suction forming boards were installed to reduce stock jumping at such high speeds.
In the press section a new water doctor and save all pans were installed before and after the first shoe press nip. This modification is reducing the rewetting of the board at such high speeds.
The most complex rebuild activity was done in the dryer section. Voith has changed the concept of the existing steam and condensate system of the pre dryer section. In connection to this the Turbo Dryer S air caps were placed in the first two dryer groups. The goal behind installing the four gas heated Air Dryers was to increase the drying capacity of the pre dryer section. To ensure a stable web run at 1,100 m/min the open draw was rebuilt to become a closed web run system at the beginning of the 2nd dryer group.
In February this year APP and Voith started up the BM 6 again. After one day BM 6 was producing top quality board at 930 m/min. In April APP reached the world record mark of 1,103 m/min for a 24-hour period of uninterrupted production.
The good cooperation between the onsite teams of APP and Voith, the experience in board making of the APP production team and Voith’s concept for the rebuild made this new benchmark in board making possible.
NipVision: A nip measurement system to make the invisible visible
- Real time system makes nip measurements possible while the paper machine is running
- Glass fiber embedded in the roll cover constantly transmits information from the nip
Modern Karton benefits from eVenFilm roll covers
The Turkish producer Modern Karton trusts in the consistent performance of the eVenFilm rubber cover on its PM 4. "The excellent performance of the cover convinced us during the last year. Running our film press with this new rubber roll cover from Voith Paper saves us up to 472,800 € per year", says Ali Ihsan Aras, Technical Director of Modern Karton.
eVenFilm for film and size presses is the latest product of the Voith Paper rubber roll covers for most challenging applications. They were developed to achieve consistent application, reliable performance and ultimate running times. The physical characteristics of the new polymer matrix include greater tear resistance, enhanced wear resistance and reduced hysteresis to provide additional benefits to the application quality and machine runability.
The Turkish company Modern Karton is part of the Eren Group and is one of the largest board and packaging paper manufacturers in Europe. At the Corlu location, 120 km west of Istanbul, 700,000 t packaging paper are produced both for the domestic market and export markets each year. This represents approx. 50 % of the Turkish production capacity. The PM 4, which started operation in April 2008, has a width of 8.6 m and produces testliner grades from 100 % recovered paper at 1,350 m/min, with an annual production capacity of 400,000 t.
Voith Paper announces price adjustment in Europe for fabrics and rolls
Effective January 1st 2012, Voith Paper Fabric & Roll Systems in Europe will increase the price for its products and services by an average of 3.8 %. This adjustment is necessary as the price increases for raw material, energy and transportation cannot be compensated by internal efficiency increases and cost saving measures only. In addition, Voith Paper will sustain a high level of value added solutions to its customers and therefore will continue to invest in Research & Development to offer innovative and sustainable products.
Voith Paper is a division of the Voith Group and the leading partner to and pioneer in the paper industry. Through constant innovations, Voith Paper is optimizing the paper manufacturing process, focusing on developing resource-saving products to reduce the use of energy, water, and fibers.
Voith sets standards in the markets energy, oil & gas, paper, raw materials and transportation & automotive. Founded in 1867, Voith employs almost 40,000 people, generates € 5.2 billion in sales, operates in about 50 countries around the world and is today one of the biggest family-owned companies in Europe.
Voith Paper gets recognition for innovation
At the beginning of October 2011, Voith Paper Automation was recognized by the federal state of Lower Austria and its Economic Chamber for its OnV FlocSpotter product. Annually about 200 projects are submitted, of which 50 are selected and recognized as the most innovative products. The awarding of the certificate took place during a ceremony for the Lower Austrian "Karl Ritter von Ghega" innovation prize.
With the OnV FlocSpotter sensor, measurement of formation is already possible in the wire section. Formation is crucial to quality in the paper manufacturing process. Until now, it could only be measured before the reel or with great effort in the laboratory. With multi-layer machines, formation of each individual layer now can be inspected separately on the wire fabric before they are couched together. The paper maker thus gets valuable information and, if there are deviations, can intervene in the process at the earliest possible point in time and adjust it.
Additionally, due to improved formation, the uniformity of the board web is increased, while printability, and thus the product quality, are improved. Hence the manufacturer profits from fewer complaints from the printing plants.
The innovation prize is awarded annually to companies whose research facilities are located in Lower Austria or which are members of the Economic Chamber of Lower Austria. Among the criteria for evaluation are the creativity and the technological level of the solution, the benefit for the user and the market opportunities of the product.