What is a CO-ROTATING TWIN SCREW EXTRUDER?

A CO-ROTATING twin screw extruder is an advanced engineered machine consisting of two inter-meshing co-rotating screws mounted on splined shafts along a process barrel. The screws are made in modular segmented sliding disks with different geometries to process a great variety of materials. In addition, this screw design is self-wiping, a feature that eliminates stagnant zones over the entire length of the process section.

The final results are high mixing efficiency with perfect self-cleaning and high quality and sizeable productivity. Twin screw extruders are more and more used in several industries such as polymer, mechanical recycling and food industries for snacks and others. Co-rotating inter-meshing designs were developed and applied for the first time in the 30s for mixing and pumping ceramic paste. The first commercial machine of this type was invented by an Italian engineer, Roberto Colombo from LMP (Italy) for thermoset and PVC processing.

ICMA has made proper this precious background and today can offer a modern and advanced range of co-rotating extruders that goes from standard co-rotating twin screw extruders up to high-torque versions to cover a very wide range of plastic compounded products. The extruders, entirely designed and manufactured by ICMA, are supplied with modular structure gearboxes adaptable to the working conditions of the various versions (low-speed, high-speed, high-torque, and high-volume).

TWIN SCREW EXTRUDER TECHNICAL FEATURES

Twin Screw Extruder has the following features:

• Modular design for screw and barrel
• Built-in water circuit for barrel cooling
• Intermeshing screw geometry
• Energy-saving heating system
• Updated electronic control devices

What are the advantages of Twin Screw Extruder?

Here are some of the main processing advantages and performances of Twin Screw Extrusion Technology:

• Highly flexible modular system
• Energy saving, low specific-energy consumption
• The high intake capacity of feed screws
• Fast recipe or color change due to self-wiping geometry
• High platinization capacity
• Calibrated control of melt temperature
• High homogenizing/distributive extrusion capacity
• High dispersive extrusion capacity
• Fine-tuning of residence time-shear/elongation stresses parameters balance
• High venting efficiency due to the large surfaces and the system modularity

Wear-resistant steel and removable liners can be applied according to the type of process.