Coating & Laminating Skills

Adhesive Application and Adhesive Selection: Chris has used his experience in adhesive formulating, material selection, market studies, and environmental testing to help clients determine appropriate adhesives for various end use applications. This has included establishing adhesive design criteria and formula selection for applications requiring oxygen and water vapor barrier properties, specialty pressure sensitive adhesive applications that had to adhere to difficult surfaces, and medical device adhesives that had to meet specific light transmission requirements. He brings to this area more than 30 years of experience and more than 10 years of consulting.

Coated Webs: Many companies are purchasing coated webs, manufacturing coated webs, or are considering backward integrating their operation to produce their own coated webs. Chris has served as a consultant to companies purchasing coated webs, helping them set up purchasing specification and in-house quality control procedures. For companies in the business of coating webs, Chris' service has been in the form of helping them develop new products, provide an objective outside opinion on new ventures or capitol improvements. Some companies, having determined that it may be to their advantage to manufacture their own coated webs (backward integration) have used Chris to specify equipment, participate in vendor negotiations, train the operators, and provide startup assistance. Chris has more than 30 years of experience in coating and laminating working for companies such as Fasson and Zimmer Paper Products. In addition he has more than 10 years of consulting into this industry.

Coating Facility: In some cases companies adding new equipment or product lines require new manufacturing facilities (i.e. building, coating equipment, QC labs, etc.), Chris has helped a few companies with overseeing the complete project under budget and on time. He has worked with general contractors and subcontractors.

Coating Machinery: Chris has designed coating machinery for various coating applications and those designs are still being used today. As National Sales Director of one of the major machine builders and as President of another, Chris has considerable experience in coating machinery design. In addition, as a long time consultant to the coating, converting, and laminating industries he has a deep understanding of the processes involved which has allowed him to apply that knowledge to coating machinery.

Coating Process: The application of the coating to the web is the heart of any coating operation. Chris has had extensive experience in a number of coating methods: roll coating, reverse roll, direct roll, 5-roll multi-roll, three roll offset, offset gravure, slot, die, pressure, saturators, rod, and Meyer rod coating. He has been used extensively to help advise companies on determining the best coating method for a given application and in laying out the best coating line configuration consistent with the customers needs. In addition, Chris' knowledge of coatings, coating rheology, materials, and his application experience has enabled him help a number of companies with the processes of coating.

Coating Weight: This is the amount of coating applied to the substrate and is normally expressed as weight per unit area (i.e. grams per sq. meter). The ideal coat weight varies by application and at times it is the lowest possible weight and in other conditions there is a very narrow window for good performance. Chris has had considerable experience in determining the ideal coating weights and in explaining the conditions affecting the target range.

Film Laminating Process: This is the lamination of two or more films and at times with the inclusion of a metal foil. Some of the processes are called Triplexing, Solventless Laminating, Solvent Laminating

Chris has been involved in the adhesive lamination of films and foils since 1969. With the advent of solventless adhesives using a four roll coater for the adhesives application and lamination, Chris has had increasing involvement with the coating application and equipment design.

Gravure Coating Process: The application of coatings using a gravure coating cylinder. The gravure cylinder is etched with cells that contain a precise volume of fluid.

The variations in gravure coating are: Direct Gravure, Reverse Gravure, and Offset Gravure. Chris has work with all of these methods in a number of different conditions.

Laminating : Paper, film, and foil laminating is a critical process and is involved in many of the converting processes. If not done properly curl, wrinkles and high waste result. Chris brings to this area more than 30 years of experience and more than 10 years of consulting. He has been involved in projects from solving field problems to helping customers select the best equipment for their operation.

Pressure Sensitive Adhesive Coating and Laminating : This is the application of an elastomeric self adhesive coating to a moving web and the subsequent lamination to a protective face material.

For more than 25 years Chris has had varying degrees of contact with this industry: 10 years consulting to PSA companies, VP Operations to a major PSA converter, and coating equipment design

Roll Coating Process: Roll coating typically refers to variations of smooth roll coating. This would include three roll direct coating for high viscosity coatings, three roll reverse for improved coating smoothness on webs that can handle the increased stress and shear, four roll coating for 100% solventless laminating adhesives, and five roll coating for very low coat weights such as those used in solventless silicone coating. In addition roll coating can refer to gravure (direct and indirect), and offset gravure which are listed separately. Chris has over 27 years experience in roll coating, from very low coat weight applications on delicate webs such as ¼ mil polyester and .00035 Al foil to heavy (15 mils) coatings on vinyl for special industrial applications. In his work as a consultant he has worked on almost every category of application.

Slot Coating Process: This is the application of coatings and adhesives through the use of a slot die. Slot coating was developed in 1967 by George Park. Chris worked on the first slot coater in 1969 at Riegel Paper Company. Since then he has chaired a number of conferences on high viscosity coating, and consulted on high viscosity coatings. Through his frequent lectures, consulting assignments, and close relationships with all of the equipment manufactures and key adhesive suppliers, Chris remains one of the leaders in the field of high viscosity coating, particularly hot melt coatings.

Web Coating Process: Chris has spent over 27 years in the web coating process. He has experience in wax coating, hot melt, solvent coating, solventless coating, and emulsion coating on a wide variety of webs from light weight films and foils to SBS boards and heavy films and vinyl's. He has worked with companies in the USA, Canada, England, Scotland, Finland, France, Denmark, and Germany.

Web Machine: As a category this separates web processes from sheet fed processes. See Web Coating, Web Handling, and Web Tracking for more information