54 Glass-Technology International 1/2015

L A M I N A T I N G T E C H N O L O G Y

T he laminated glass market is under-going an important

and long-lasting change thanks to recent progress made by Hornos Pujol, breaking the existing bar-riers to date with its new product Evalam Visual. This EVA developed by Pujol is a substitute of PVB for laminated glass, corroborated by a number of forums that defend this data and architects are now starting to use EVA in their important projects.While it was well-known and accepted that EVA was an expensive material but with higher quality in terms of moisture resistance, bet-ter fluidity for decorative interlayer insertions and higher adhesion, thus of-fering fewer delamination

problems, the fact remains that to start a revolution in the laminating market, Pujol had to develop two points that had to converge in time to achieve the pre-sent success. On the one hand, a mate-rial which provides tech-nical advantages over PVB in terms of transparency, acoustic, delamination, durability and resistance at the same cost as PVB (Evalam Visual) and on the other hand, a new process with higher production ca-pacity than that obtained in an Autoclave, with a three-times lower investment and lower production and maintenance costs in order to obtain lower cost per unit output of laminated glass (Automatic Fast Cu-ring EVA plant).

EVALAM VISUALEvalam Visual is manu-factured in Europe and is the only product that has, so far, been able to obtain values of transparency bet-ter than those achieved by PVB with 0.38 millimetres of thickness.Its adhesion is three times higher than PVB, which, together with its resistan-ce to moisture with open edge and its high crosslink, makes it thermally and me-chanically steady over time, obtaining an ideal product for laminated tempered glasses with high added va-lue. Its durability over time is enhanced by increasing the lifecycle of the mate-rials used for laminated

glass by reaching 100 per cent UV filtering to 380nm rays. Evalam Visual is also considered acoustic, obtai-ning much higher values than those achieved by standard PVB.These values, combined with its high resistance, are the major reasons why Eva-lam Visual is positioned as a major technical material over those obtained by PVB.

AUTOMATIC FAST CURING EVA PLANTThe new plant consist of an automatic production

Hornos Pujol BREAKING BARRIERS;

REACHING THE NEW AGE OF

LAMINATED GLASS

parency bet-achieved bymillimetres

hree times B, which,

resistan-ith open rosslink, and me-er time, roduct

mpereded va-

time asing

ate-ted

glass by reaching 100 percent UV filtering to 380nmrays. Evalam Visual is alsoconsidered acoustic, obtai-ning much higher valuesthan those achieved bystandard PVB.These values, combined with its high resistance, arethe major reasons why Eva-lam Visual is positioned asa major technical materialover those obtained by PVB.

AUTOMATIC FAST CURING EVA PLANTAThe new plant consist of an automatic production

55Glass-Technology International 1/2015

line and high-speed con-vection furnace to lamina-te with EVA, Fast Curing has been developed by Pujol for automate the manufacture of lamina-ted glass with EVA re-ducing manufacturing cost and increasing the quality of the lamina-ted glass to squaring these automatically and without effort by the operator, so that

is able to maintain high productions rates.

COMPETITIVE ADVANTAGES VERSUS TRADITIONAL AUTOCLAVE SYSTEMSReduction of energy consumption

The elements that produ-ce greater energy expense on a traditional Autoclave

Plant are the white cham-ber with dehumidifier and the climate control systems with the nipper roll oven of the pre-pressing process. In an Automatic Fast Cu-ring EVA Plant these ele-ments are not necessary, thus significantly reducing energy consumption and dramatically lowering the production cost of lami-nated glass. This reduced costs can be seen especially with regards to the fact that it is no longer necessary to maintain the white cham-ber up and running 24 hours/day – 365 day/year to keep the storage condi-tions of PVB film.

Reduction of investment

The investment in an Auto- matic Fast Curing EVA Plant compared to an Au-toclave plant can be calcu-lated as a quarter, which makes the cost of amor-tization chargeable for a square meter much lower.

Evalam Visual, manufactured in

Europe by Hornos Pujol, is contributing

in an important change in the laminated

glass sector. This product, which,

according to its manufacturer, is the

only product that has, so far, been able

to obtain values of transparency better

than those achieved by PVB, can now

be used in a new a new process – the

Automatic Fast Curing EVA plant.

www.shutterstock.com

L A M I N A T I N G T E C H N O L O G Y

This factor determines, together with energy con-sumption and the human labour, a faster or smal-ler cost/price to amortize the plant.In an Autoclave lamina-ted plant these factors are highly impaired by having an energy mainte-nance cost that increases on reduction of expected demand.Its lower investment is mainly determined by:

humidity and climate conditions to storage and process PVB;

transformers due to re-duction in the required installed power;

-form important civil works to fit the plant in the existing factories;

space required.

Reduction in number of layers in tempered glassThanks to the pressure of the vacuum bag applies on the glass edge and control that can be exerted on it; is possible to reduce the number of necessaries lay-ers in laminated tempered glass using only a thickness of 0.76 millimetres com-pared to 1.52 millimetres using in traditional Sy-stems Autoclave to reduce the numbers of losses by the roller wave and edge bending of temper glass that can not be prevent even in the nipper roll or with manual edge clam-ping in Autoclaves. Which even more, create punctual distortions when they are used to minimize losses for roller waving deviations between glasses.

Service improvement

To be profitable, an Au-toclave Plant must have a

minimum annual demand of about 200,000 square metres of laminated glass.Currently, many are not working every day and it’s difficult to fill them, which often convinces not to use this method, if not to reduce losses and to servi-ce the customers.With Pujol’s Automatic Fast Curing EVA Plant this problem has been sol-ved, as it is able to produ-ce both, large and small productions at stable energy costs, which allow machine downtime and service to the customers regardless of demand. Thus may occur daily and flexibly providing excel-lent customer service.

High production

The new Pujol Automatic Fast Curing EVA Plant is able to manufacture profit-ably from 50 squa-re metres per day to over

1,000 square metres per day depending on the size and capacity of the oven adapting into the peak de-mand for projects curren-tly existing in the market.In conclusion, we can confirm that Pujol with its latest developments positions Evalam Visual and the Pujol Automa-tic Fast Curing150 EVA Plant as the most reliable and cost-effective option for producing laminated glass, remaining at the forefront of new deve-lopments in the field of laminated glass getting:

-nated glass;

maintenance cost

flexibility adapted to demand;

customers due to shor-ter service time;

s Industriales Pujol S.A.Hornos Industriales Pujjjo

C. Del Plà, N° 108-110 - Pol. Ind. “El Pla”

08980 Sant Feliu de llobregat (Barcelona) - Spain

Tel: +34 – 93 – 6855672

Fax: +34 – 93 – 6855392

E-mail: hipujol@hornospujol.com

www.hornospujol.com

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