Web Handling Troubleshooting Using MapleSim Web Handling Library

In the competitive landscape of web handling and converting systems, there is increased pressure to reduce downtime, optimize the production line throughput and keep the material quality consistently high. As plastic films, laminates, non-wovens, and other web materials flow across rollers at high speeds, small physical fluctuations in the process quickly develop into show-stopping quality issues such as wrinkles, curl, permanent deformation or breakouts, and loss of control of the web’s position laterally or longitudinally.
For the engineers and operators tasked with troubleshooting and avoiding these conditions, there has been the challenge of how to assess the impact of tension variations, and then to quantify the remedy and test it before applying it to the production system. New developments in engineering modeling offer a simpler path to create a reliable virtual representation of the web handling system, allowing companies that are new to simulation to use the analytical capabilities to speed-up troubleshooting and providing greater insight into the real-world web line issues.
Join industry expert Steve Lange (ProcessDev, LLC) as he presents ways to use virtual models of physical roll-to-roll lines created in MapleSim to provide deeper understanding of the web handling and tension control strategies. Using the advanced models created using the Maplesim Web Handling Library, Steve shares insights gained in his 35-year career working with materials for the consumer goods industry to approach common web handling issues using simulation before taking action on the physical line. This step of representing the production system in a virtual modeling environment allows analysis and exploration of “what-if” scenarios to narrow down the best solution, saving time and reducing material wastage. Using a variety of use-case examples from converting, laminating and wind/unwind processes, Steve walks through how to use MapleSim to troubleshoot web line problems and develop control strategies that optimize the web and roller interactions, avoid slippage and reduce the risk of wrinkles and roller misalignment.
The MapleSim Web Handling Library offers a set of modeling components focused on simulating roll-to-roll processes, and provides built-in analytical apps that help manage tension across web spans, optimize the web speed, and reduce web slippage.
Attendees of this presentation will learn the following:
- Common web handling challenges that can be addressed faster by using simulation
- How to identify hotspots where web tension fluctuations may occur
- Strategies for reducing web slippage, wrinkles, and lamination curl
- Introduction to the ready-to-use modeling components available in MapleSim Web Handling Library including drives, brakes, dancers, idler/nip rollers or accumulators
- How a MapleSim model can represent the web material properties, tension across spans and the dynamics of the system
0:00 Welcome and Agenda
1:12 Intro to Modeling using MapleSim
3:34 Unwind with Dancer example
5:20 Using Sensor Probes
5:59 Simulation Results
7:57 Web Handling Challenges
8:44 Traction Loss on Rollers
11:51 Web Slip Example
16:00 Low Web Tension in a web path
18:12 Accumulator Example
23:42 Web Lamination Curl
28:18 Web Troughs and Wrinkles
33:09 Roller Misalignment Angle
33:57 Multi-span Web Path example
42:42 Summary
44:05 Q&A Industry Discussion
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