Mondi’s Bag Application Centre celebrates 5th anniversary
Over the last five years Mondi’s Bag Application Centre (BAC) in the Austrian Alps has established an impressive track record in testing and simulating industrial bags, as part of the technical development process. The BAC is an important component of the Mondi’s overall commitment to comprehensive, customer-oriented product development, from fibre resources to the final packaging solutions.
Mondi has many decades of experience in developing and producing industrial bags. Over the years, Mondi industrial bag innovations have included the development of high-performance paper and stateof-the-art de-aeration techniques optimised for high-speed filling. “Customers whose products require special protection have come to rely on Mondi’s wealth of knowledge around sophisticated features such as hermetic vacuum sealing and barrier liners,” explains Thomas Ott, COO of Mondi Industrial Bags.
At the Mondi BAC, where activities are oriented to rigorous testing and simulation, the application engineering team perform analysis in areas such as bag strength, de-aeration properties, filling behaviour, and bag performance under various storage conditions. State-of-the-art equipment is used to test bag design and construction, e.g. a high-speed camera (1000 images per second) for observing behaviour during drop tests, and a climate chamber for assessing performance under hot, humid, or other demanding conditions. Air permeability testing is performed using Mega Gurley equipment, and filling behaviour is tested using customised air packers. “In 2012, over 1200 Mega Gurley tests were performed, almost 700 bags were filled and drop-tested and for almost 100 bags we checked the water vapour transmission rate,” says Thomas Ott about the BAC’s performance. “And one very specific competency at the BAC is that we are certified to test bags for hazardous goods”, he points out.
Mondi’s BAC currently employs a team of application engineers, who cooperate closely with Mondi’s R&D Innovation Centre, located nearby in Frantschach, where the focus is on developing new or improved sack kraft paper. Overall efforts are geared to achieving steady improvement, with the goal of taking industrial bag solutions to a whole new level. “The close proximity to our kraft paper colleagues also helps the bag development since we can work closely together on each project,” explains Ott. “Yet another plus is Natro Tech, Mondi’s own filling equipment producer. Having filling experts within the business supports improving the bags’ adaptation tremendously,” he adds.
Mondi provides industrial bags to a broad range of industries and, by working closely with customers and listening to their feedback, the product range continues to adapt and improve. When no immediate solution is available for a customer’s specific needs, Mondi can work collaboratively to develop a suitable solution while experts from Natro Tech are available to visit customers’ facilities to help adapt solutions on site.
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