IŞILSAN Saves Time, Money with Self-lubricating Polymer

The Challenge

Textile manufacturers invest millions of dollars in high-speed spinning lines to push the limits of quality, consistency and production efficiency. Downtime, scheduled or not, is unwelcome – and it’s often due to a plastic part that costs less than a dollar.

Istanbul-based IŞILSAN makes these plastic spinning tubes and bobbins, used on the world’s most advanced textile machinery to carry thread and spun yarn. But as the newest generation of machines introduced higher operating speeds and increased mechanical loads, it became clear that the plastic used to make the bushings was no longer suitable under the punishing conditions.

If a bushing gave out, production had to stop. And that wasn’t good for IŞILSAN’s customers, which are textile producers and original equipment manufacturers alike. 

The manufacturer needed a new way to make its parts. 

The Solution

In an effort to strengthen the bushings, the company’s engineering team tested materials from several suppliers, but the LubriOne™ wear-resistant compounds from Avient were the most intriguing.

These advanced polymer solutions provide a low coefficient of friction and improved wear resistance properties, and can be applied to a wide range of engineering resins. But the specific product that would meet all of the company’s requirements didn’t exist. 

Closely working together, IŞILSAN and a Avient technical team developed a new polyamide-based formulation that provided the wear resistance of LubriOne™ with improved structural strength. Combined, these innovations extended the spinning rods’ durability for textile equipment running at line speeds of up to 20,000 RPM. 

The Impact

With improved bushings, IŞILSAN was able to provide its customers with a more competitive product than ever before – while also making improvements in its own injection-molding operations:

• Reduced scrap. The company, which does its own injection molding, found that the polyamide and LubriOne™ combination generated a 50% reduction in scrap rates. 
• Improved cycle times. The new material combination also resulted in a 40% improvement in cycle time for production of the bushings – freeing machine time for other projects that might otherwise have required capital investment to increase capacity.
• Improved customer satisfaction. Switching to LubriOne™ helped IŞILSAN improve wear resistance of these bushings so that customers can run machines longer without maintenance. 

“Avient delivered exceptional service,” said Ibrahim Bey, general manager at IŞILSAN. “They provided rapid response to our request and helped us to provide the best quality system to our customers.”