The Blog

Working within the Customer Support department at Protective Packaging offers new and exciting challenges every day. We are often contacted by Customers asking for advise on particular applications, below is an enquiry we received where the customer needed our help and expertise.

“I need to pack thousands of small metal components for shipment to and storage in the tropics. They are each 2x1x1cm and have arrived in cardboard boxes with pigeon hole partitions. They need to stay in these boxes but are too small for individual foil bags so how can I ensure they are protected from moisture damage”

Our response to the question was;  “You should be able to enclose the boxes into desiccated foil bags. We would need to know the weight of the cardboard within each bag to calculate the dunnage factor in the British Standard desiccant formula so we can advise how much desiccant is required per bag. We would advise to spread the desiccant throughout the pack and always ensure the components are not in direct contact with cardboard i.e. wrapped in open cell foam or similar as cardboard can become acidic when damp”.

With 25 years expertise under our belts, we can come up with a solution for the most unusual requirements.

You can contact our Customer Support team on 0161 976 2006 for our help & advise.

I started working for Protective Packaging at the end of January 2013. My role is IT Assistant.

Being the second Apprentice within the business, I am very honoured to have been given this opportunity as I have learnt so much within my first 3 months here, and I look forward to seeing what further knowledge can be provided.

In the first month of working with Protective Packaging I had a brief overview with each department within the company. The most interesting department for me was Hand Fabrication as I learnt all about the barrier foil laminates that we use and the styles of bags and liners which we are able to produce; this which I had absolutely no knowledge of until I started working here. I also enjoyed learning about our container desiccant, ProDriPole, in addition to the impact and damage detection products we sell, such as ShockWatch and TiltWatch.

I am very keen to be successful as an IT Assistant and I am determined to continue this role. I also attend Manchester College one day a week as part of gaining a qualification as an IT Apprentice.

Here at Protective Packaging Ltd in Manchester we have a football divide with staff supporting Manchester United and Manchester City, this causes a lot of banter around the company.

This weekend saw both sides running high on emotions – City lost to Wigan in the FA Cup final and their Manager Roberto Mancini has been sacked. United, although on a high from winning and collecting the 20th Premier League Trophy saw Sir Alex Ferguson at his last game at Old Trafford before retiring next week.

But after the highs and the lows of the weekend it’s back to work with the manufacture of Automated and Hand Fabricated Barrier Foil Bags and Liners.

To see the benefits of our Barrier Foil packaging please visit our website or have a chat with our Customer Support team (about football or foil bags!) on 0161 976 2006

Sarah (Man U Fan)

Every day at Protective Packaging we get requests for a confirmation that one of our aluminium foil laminates conforms to a particular industrial or National Defence Standard and if so, to which class(e) and type.  Now, as there are not that many of these Standards, it is not a big problem to keep pace with progress.

When we get to the European Standards, however, that is a different story. There are many of them, dealing with a wide number of issues, particularly if the item is to be stored in contact with food, e.g.:-
Its heavy metal content,
Any additives sourced from animals (BSE/TSE),
Migration tests for specific foodstuffs,
Presence of specific chemicals e.g. phthalates, specific flames retardants, bisphenol A, and so on.
Some foils have to be ‘nut free’ or have not to contain certain components that will react adversely when used to support nuclear components.
Then we have the European pharmacopoeia, which deals with, amongst many issues, containers for pharmaceutical preparations. This edict is legally binding and many of our pharmaceutical customers want to be assured that our foils are not going to have any adverse affects on their products.

Then, we have the all-encompassing declarations such as REACH, which asks suppliers of all types of chemical compounds and mixtures to declare any hazard.

Finally the European Agencies’ are constantly required to revise their original Standards in line with technological and industrial advances. Then the original standards and revisions procreate at a frightening rate.

However, none of these issues need concern you – the Protective Packaging Limited customer. We are constantly on the look-out for anything new so that it can be reflected as necessary in our technical data sheets and declarations. Our information is always up to date to ensure that we can provide the necessary assurances that your product, which you have made with the utmost of dedication, will not be contaminated by the packaging.

Here at Protective Packaging we’ve just had a great night out at Belle Vue Greyhounds, fully sponsored by the company. The evening started with a three course meal and included lots of drinks and provide a great social event after a busy week manufacturing barrier foil bags and liners. It was held on Friday 26th April 2013 and we would like to thank the Board of Directors and all those responsible for making this possible.

Cheers for a great night!

The impulse heated hand sealer allows you to seal bags and is designed for all kinds of thermoplastic materials. The sealer is suitable for films such as polyethylene or polypropylene.

The thickness of the material to be sealed should not exceed 1mm.

We can offer you a range of sealing bar lengths: 30, 40, 50 or 60 cm. The width of the sealing bar is 3mm.

In comparison to sealers for heat sealable barrier films, where the temperature remains constant once it has been set, the impulse sealer comes with a separate power supply unit that allows you to select the sealing time for different materials according to their thickness. For each seal that you need to do, you can adjust the impulse generator. When you close the bars, the impulse generator sends electric impulses that heats them.

How to use? Put the material to be sealed between the sealing bars. Close the bars. An indicating light shows the sealing time of 2 to 3 seconds. The light will turn off once this time has elapsed but you should keep the bars closed for a little longer. Then open the bars and the seal will be complete.

We also provide a maintenance and repair service if required.

Please note: The impulse heat hand sealer is not suitable for heat sealable barrier films with an aluminium layer or with a PET/ALU/PE composition. For heat sealable barrier films please contact us and we will be happy to give you information regarding constant heated hand sealers.  

With previous experience in both commercial stills, video production and a feature film credit for creating visual effect shots, I have recently been working in house with our Marketing team in order to produce a number of videos.

You won’t find a space craft of flesh eating zombies but you will find videos on our products such as our container desiccant, ProDriPole, and our 3D barrier foil bags which can be used for corrosion prevention of goods destined for export.

More videos will be uploaded soon to give customers an insight into the wide variety products we sell.

Humidity indicators provide a humidity monitor of the bag contents – a measure of the effectiveness of the aluminium barrier foil bag and desiccant at protecting your products against moisture ingress.

Indicators can be integrated into the bag along with the required amount of desiccant to continually monitor the relative humidity.

We have several types of humidity indicators that can be hermetically fitted directly into an aluminium foil liner (screw-in-indicator) or a spot indicator which we can fit behind a clear barrier window, both can then be monitored from the outside to check the relative humidity inside the liner.

Humidity indicators are particularly suited to applications where the pack is stored on-site for long periods of time.

Call our sales team for more information on this product.

Odour transfer from packed food based products can attract all kinds of unwanted problems.
Flexible barrier foil bags and liners provide a means of containing odour and maintaining flavours as they were intended to be.

For instance shipping a mixture of flavoured and plain teas abroad is now possible without one tainting the taste of another, by using a hermetically sealed barrier foil cover and base sheet on pallets of flavoured teas, thereby protecting pallets of non-flavoured teas in the same container from taste taint.

We even supply barrier foil liners for corn based poison pest bait travelling to warm climates. Polyethylene and similar low barrier films allow the corn aroma to escape, attracting unwanted herbivorous pests such as weevils which can attack such films, infiltrate the product and destroy it. Changing to barrier foil liners completely prevents the initial insect attraction by containing the product odour. Even if the pest somehow knew there was ‘food’ in the liners, it could never succesfully invade them due to the aluminium layer in the foil laminate forming a impenetrable barrier to insect infestation.

Odours and flavours kept in, pests kept out, with one easy solution.

We’re delighted to announce our success once again in the the Alufoil Trophy 2013.

Our winning entry, the RescueTec foil pouch provides a solution for repairing mobile phones or other electronic devices which have been damaged by immersion in water.

Find out all about the award and the judges comments in the Alufoil Association  press release