Blog
Views, commentaries, opinions and packaging industry updates from the world of Southgate.
The Facts on… Safety Cutters
| Taping and Ancillary
Let’s start with a shocking statistic: A study by the US Office for Health & Safety found that 30% of the $20 billion lost on damaged merchandise was caused by using an unsuitable box cutter. The shockingly high statistic of thirty percent leads to the question- what is a suitable box cutter? Whilst a large …
The Facts On… Heat Sealers
| Taping and Ancillary
One of the fastest ways to securely pack products in plastic is to heat seal them. The two layers of plastic are clamped together and an electrical current passes through a sealing wire next to them. This melts and welds the two films together. When the plastic cools it hardens and the seal becomes as …
The Air27 pneumatic carton stapler
| Stapling
Just about, everyone owns a stapler. Staplers are used at the office, at home, work places and even in medical settings. When a package is delivered, there is a good chance that a stapler helped to seal that package. A stapler is a Mechanical devise that joins pages of paper or similar martial by driving …
Battle of the Bands
| Strapping
If you are banding large items or palletised loads, there’s a high chance that you will be using a manual strapping tool. This is fine for occasional use, but if your throughput increases you could soon find yourself on the ropes. Before you throw in the towel, consider switching to a friction weld tool. Take …
Rely on Southgate® to Guard your Borders
| Transit
Products need protecting from low-impact damage during storage and transport, particularly pallets. Actions such as Careless forklifting, load movement and even over-tension as a result of strapping or stretch wrap film, are common causes of damage. Southgate has a catalogue of different edging content: Kraftek® Edge Boards Kraftek® edge boards are made of resilient Kraft-wrapped …
The Facts on… Shrink Wrapping
| Taping and Ancillary
What film should I use? If you’re shrink wrapping big stuff like pallet loads or furniture, you’ll need fairly hefty polythene film. This is available in several formats on a wide roll, which is usually held on a mobile roll dispenser Centrefold or multifold polythene shrink sheeting Folding the film before it’s wound onto the …
The Facts On… Corner Protection
| Strapping, Transit
Corner protectors made from injection moulded polypropylene come in three styles – closed, expanding and open. Closed corner protectors look a bit like a shallow, square box cut diagonally across the top and are made to fit a range of sheet material thicknesses. Typically they protect the corners of fixed-depth products such as table tops …
The Facts on… Packaging Tapes
| Taping and Ancillary
Most packaging tapes are used to seal boxes and packages, and of these, most are plastic tapes with a self-adhesive (pressure-sensitive) backing. Packing tapes Packing tapes are primarily used to seal carton joints but their uses within and beyond packaging are wide. Polypropylene tape The majority of packing tapes are manufactured using an extruded polypropylene …
The Facts on… Staplers
| Stapling
Perhaps the best known and most widely used stapling tools are anvil staplers; the humble, general purpose office stapler is one of these. As the name suggests, the stapling head strikes against an anvil that crimps the staple legs together and back against whatever is being stapled. This ensures the staple contents are held securely …
Strap pallets at speed with the TPS200V
| Machinery, Strapping
The Optimax® packaging equipment brand covers a wide range of strapping systems. Many are designed for strapping smaller parcels, and these range from semi-automatic table strappers to fully automatic arch strappers that can apply multiple straps at speed and be integrated within automated packing lines. Handheld cordless friction weld tools offer versatility and convenience when …