Since the production line was revived, it turned out that the existing process had difficulty with cutting, laminating, and handling the present, 30-50 μm thin-film material of the rail. Demcon Industrial Systems was asked to develop a robust and reliable new solution for cutting and laminating. Preconditions: it should be able to handle 180 films per minute and be highly flexible in handling different film types and sizes.

Out of various options, a circular knife promised the best cutting results. To address possible wear issues, extensive tool lifetime tests were carried out. These proved that even after a million cycles there is still a clean cut. The system is designed for low maintenance. The use of leaf springs and extremely reliable bearings leads to a whopping 22 million cycles of maintenance-free operation. The eventual exchange of wear-sensitive tools leads to minimal downtime.

The laminating process was also revised. The ‘hot block’ technology remained, but with the use of a copper alloy instead of steel for better heat transfer. To optimize the process critical process timing, the mechanical control system was replaced by a mechatronic camming system seeing to millisecond range accuracy in servomotor control.