| Cost Benefits Of 250°F Bookbinding EVA's |
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| National Starch documents savings that bookbinders gain by switching to COOL-BIND™ low temperature EVA hot melt adhesive. These are convincing points for switching to the low-temperature hot melt. They show the excellent job the adhesive performs. |
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| Hard Savings |
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| Hard savings come from lighter impact on equipment, less cleanup, and uninterrupted production. |
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| Bearings |
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| The bearings in glue pots crystallize much faster with a 350°F than a 250°F hot melt. Taking a conservative estimate, bearings should last twice as long. |
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| Potential savings: 8 hours labor at $200/hour, plus $600 for a set of bearings. |
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| Glue pot heating elements |
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| Malfunctioning heating elements in the pot force other components in the pot to cycle more often and overheat, causing hot spots and hot melt degradation. Costs can be significant. In addition, because of malfunctioning heating elements, book binding at improper temperatures can bring on poor quality. |
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| Potential savings: Elements will last four times longer under lower heat. Each element costs, on average, $60 apiece and requires two hours labor (at $200/hour). |
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| Premelter heating elements |
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| Depending on type and style of premelter, heating elements often burn out from higher temperatures. Costs of these elements are higher than those in glue pots. |
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| Potential savings: Elements are replaced as often as twice a year from high temperatures - at $800-1300 each and 8 hours labor at $200/hour. |
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| Cleanup |
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| Most premelters and pots are cleaned twice a year. When running at lower temperatures, cleaning pre-melters is not required. The glue pot may require cleaning only once a year from paper dust char. |
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| Potential savings: 8 hours labor at $200/hour. |
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| Energy |
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| Two of our customers measured the reduction in wattage and came up with surprising savings from temperatures 75°-100° lower than conventional EVA's in the glue pot and premelters. |
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| Potential savings: Maintenance people can easily measure the difference in energy used over a period of time and calculate the savings based on electricity costs. We have seen savings in excess of $1/hour per line. |
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| Production interruptions |
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| Stan-dard EVA's building up on the knives of the trimmer as well as char building up on the back spinner can cause short stoppages in production. If these minor problems are not corrected, major quality problems can develop. |
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| Potential savings: Production stoppages can reach 1-2 hours per month. Savings are based on the average revenue generated per line per hour. |
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| Soft Savings |
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| Book/magazine quality |
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| Reduction of wrinkling on cross grain paper can reduce customer complaints and produce a high quality book. Trimming quality, with fewer chip-outs and less cover wrinkling, can also reduce customer complaints. The better and more immediate adhesion of low temperature EVA's assures better quality, especially on difficult coated stock or heavy inserts. |
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| Worker comfort |
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| In today's full employment environment, worker comfort is a real plus. Machine operators react very positively to the elimination of smoke and odor from the low temperature hot melt. |
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| Safety |
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| Serious accidental burns are eliminated when operating in the 250°F range. An added benefit: insurance rates drop when you achieve a strong track record of safety. Overall improvement in consistency of performance. Many serious field complaints we have seen in the past 25 years trace to chemical changes in the adhesive. These, more than likely, are caused by overheating. If a hot melt at 250°F does not char, then it is also not changing compositionally. This means the viscosity remains the same. Unchanged viscosity means the machining remains the same, and the adhesive application is more consistent. No phasing of the ingredients occurs; the adhesive properties remain the same. |
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