A new important order for a new project in Bangladesh marks two main achievements for Cubotex: the Country represents not only a new market for Cubotex, but also the order involves the supply of a full automated plant including both hank dyeing and drying machines for the production of mercerized cotton. Delivery is planned within the first quarter of 2022, and the order was acquired together with our local exclusive agent Tootal Quality Resources.
Mercerizing process is a special treatment of cotton fiber aimed to improve dye uptake and tear strength of the fiber. Mercerized cotton is the highest quality cotton on the market: after this treatment, the yarn section shape becomes round and better reflects the light giving the fabrics an extraordinary brightness effect.
The order sees Cubotex as the unique manufacturer and supplier of all the machines that compose the dyeing plant, covering the automation of the entire hank dyeing and drying process.
This has been possible thanks to the acquisition of Alea brand, finalized by Cubotex in July 2020. Alea is an Italian manufacturer with 150 years of experience in the design and production of textile dryers. There is no other company in the world with such a long history in this field.
The new dryers, now under the brand of Alea by Cubotex, allowed us to start a complete re-engineering, providing an important technological upgrade to implement advanced automation concepts and a more modern approach in terms of efficiency and sustainability.
On dyeing machines and dryer, we will use the same controller and PLC for a better plant standardization and for a more operator-friendly system. The new design of the dryer also led to construction improvements, increasing efficiency both in terms of consumption levels and productivity.
Among the improvements, the dryer has been equipped with a new automatic squeezing system which ensures a more efficient extraction of water from the cotton hanks. Cotton hanks are therefore automatically forwarded to the drying section with re-designed hot air conveyors and fans.
In order to achieve a better efficiency of the overall process, the pneumatic system of the squeezer has been replaced using encoders, providing better precision and control accuracy of the process.
The complete automation of the hank drying process requires the intervention of a single operator only, for the loading of hanks at the beginning, drastically reducing labor with total reliability.
Finally, the same Cubotex approach for direct consumption measurement installed on our dyeing machines has been also implemented in the new dryer. The monitoring and control of the consumption of energy gives the customer full transparency upon the overall dyeing and drying process, providing a clear insight on the effective final cost of the product.
