ABB Automation

Web handling is a broad category of products that can range from slitters/rewinders, web guides, register, tension controls, and web inspection. Web guiding and tension control are two factors that help converters control waste as well as the web’s “wobble” as it comes off the roll. In the case of tension control, sensor selection is a major factor. Using low-cost sensors that require constant recalibration is no longer acceptable to converters. Tension Control Issues Although some converters may be intimidated by the tension control concept, the waste reduction and improvement in product quality are more than worth the investment. “Tension control is perhaps

The Web Handling Research Center studies the science and technology that drive web handling. WEB HANDLING IS a science every packaging printer or converter should understand. It's applied physics that carries a continuous-roll substrate through printing and/or converting machines with the goal being a defect-free end product. The Web Handling Research Center (WHRC), based at Oklahoma State University in Stillwater, Okla., has spent the last 20 years studying this science. The WHRC was initiated in 1986 as a National Science Foundation center with a mission "to advance the knowledge base in technologies applicable to the transport and control of continuous-strip materials through processes and