Lead Center Special Sealing Industry (LC SSI) has established a production line for extruded sealing profiles in Taicang (China).
In Brief
Collaboration and Training: Successful start of the new production line involved close collaboration between Weinheim and Taicang, including training of Chinese colleagues.
Local Production in Taicang: Lead Center Special Sealing Industry (LC SSI) has established a production line for extruded sealing profiles in Taicang, China.
Customer Proximity: The principle of “local for local” is part of the Freudenberg Group’s global business philosophy, ensuring fast response times through short supply chains.
Strategic Importance: Strengthening business in China is crucial for Freudenberg Sealing Technologies (FST) due to China’s leadership in international wind turbine construction.
Technology Transfer: The production process from Weinheim was transferred one-to-one to Taicang to meet increasing demand.
Customer proximity through local production, “local for local”, is a principle of the Freudenberg Group’s global business philosophy – for fast response times through short supply chains. This strategy is particularly relevant when a country or region is a global leader in an industry, such as China in international wind turbine construction. Nowhere else in the world so many wind turbines are connected to the grid, and nowhere else do these turbines produce anywhere near as much green electricity.
It is therefore extremely important for Freudenberg Sealing Technologies (FST) to strengthen its business in China locally. There is also a second strategic aspect: globally active customers expect to be able to access local production around the world. Not being present in China would risk losing business with global customers on other continents as well.
Lead Center Special Sealing Industry has been producing sealing profiles in Weinheim for years that are tailored to the requirements of wind turbines. They are used either high up in the nacelle bearings and in the blade bearings for blade adjustment. Or at the very bottom, in offshore turbines at the transition point between the tower and the foundation anchored in the seabed, the so-called monopile.
On the two Weinheim extrusion lines, the raw material is first mixed in an extruder like in a meat grinder and then pressed through a shaping nozzle. The profile, which resembles endless spaghetti, is then vulcanized at high temperatures in a continuous process. It is first heated with ultra-high frequency (UHF) radiation, as in a microwave at home, and then vulcanized in a hot air channel. After cooling, the profiles are cut to the desired length and then the two ends are glued together or butt vulcanized. The meter-long sealing profile or the ready-made sealing ring with a meter-long diameter is finished.
“We have transferred exactly this process one-to-one to our plant in Taicang, China,” reports Nico Calandra, Process Development, LC SSI. “With a buffer for the future,” he adds, meaning that individual system components are designed in such a way that they can satisfy increasing demand in the future.
In this specific case, “local for local” also meant that the new production line in China was built as a turnkey solution by a local plant manufacturer and handed over to Taicang NOK- Freudenberg. It also meant that the materials to be processed on the line were manufactured directly in the country, at NOK-Freudenberg China’s mixing plant in Wuxi.
All of this had to be organized. For Calandra, this included an online factory tour of the Chinese plant manufacturer in question, a specialist in rubber extrusion, right at the start of the project. This was followed by the training of two Chinese colleagues in Weinheim, the online acceptance of the line at the manufacturer’s premises and involvement in the commissioning and final acceptance on site in Taicang. “In Taicang, my job was to put the line through its paces. I wanted to make sure that the line was really capable of manufacturing our products as we know them from Europe,” says the process engineer.
In the meantime, all teething problems have been resolved and the employees in China are familiar with the technology of a continuous extrusion line, which was completely new to them. “The technical process issues were dealt with very quickly,” recalls Calandra of the top cooperation with the plant manufacturer. The next step was to document the exact processes in clear process instructions and establish them in practice. Here too, the parties from Weinheim and Taicang worked together as partners. “The system is now up and running and we are in contact with customers for sampling.”
The close ties between Taicang and Weinheim will continue to exist. The partners are currently examining in a joint initiative whether the extrusion technology in Taicang can also be used beyond the traditional wind power business.
