The Circuit

Whether you attend or exhibit at one or 100 trade shows per year, everyone is different. There is a different industry, a different city, a different set of challenges and a new set of opportunities. Regardless of the show, the goals are usually the same; find new products that help you further your business, cement and further current relationships and cultivate new ones. And it¹s non-stop. From the time you leave for the airport to the time you return home, you will no doubt run into someone heading to or from the same show.

So what¹s new? At the shows we attended recently, IWF in Atlanta and the SPE Thermoforming Conference in Nashville, we saw new machinery, new tooling and new materials. Many of them are featured in this issue and more will be showcased in our November/December Year in Review issue. Do you thermoform cut sheet? In Cooling the Formed Part, Mike Alongi puts the spotlight on removing the heat. In order to achieve faster cycle times with materials that have longer cooling characteristics, you must accommodate the cooling process. And turn to New Resins for Cut Sheet Thermoformers to read about the latest innovation for large part thermoformer from The Dow Chemical Company.

Whether you are new or old to routing plastics, reviews “Preparing for Plastic Routing”, by Van Niser, will help you increase productivity, while producing higher quality parts. Part 2 will be featured in the November/December issue. Finally, in Safety Solutions, Jack Podojil has toured many facilities in his 35 years on the job and seen many things. This month he asks “Would You Risk Your Employee's Life?” See what Jack is offering to help you make your business safer.

And what ties all the great information found in this issue together? Our website. We have an eight year archive with multiple articles on cutting, bending, bonding, forming, welding plus tooling, material, machinery and accessories. Our entire website is keyword searchable and features an on-line version of our 2006 Buyer’s Guide with hotlinks and E-mail links to over 100 leading suppliers and services for our industry. With nearly a half million visitors per year, it offers the largest resource of plastic shapes information on the web.

Enjoy the issue,