As big opportunities open up for high precision, high volume medical applications driven by increasing healthcare expenditure, Husky powered by Schottli pitches in with an array of medical parts in a bid to promote a unique integrated system approach to medical equipment injection moulding.
In a webinar powered by Manufacturing Today and presented by Husky Technologies, industry veteran for 20 years Hiren Khatri, Key Account Manager – SAARC Husky Technologies, let the audience into ‘How the latest mould technologies helps drive growth with the most popular medical applications.’
Medical tooling
Khatri inspected the macro economic factors driving the medical industry and set the context for the discourse on Husky’s medical tooling and how Husky supports its customers to develop high performance injection mould.
The moulds are uniquely value-added with an extensive array of tooling technologies that provide the customer with best output per investment. The hot runner technology, the quick change system, the thread unscrewing, the synchronized slide actuation and the cluster system were the tooling technologies that Khatri presented.
Whether it was the thread core technology that allowed quick access to the sensitive luer lock feature even when the mould was in place; or the unique slider operating concept that allowed for compact and easy-to-maintain slider mould solution, Khatri assured of the best result per investment.
Finding special mention and elaborate exposition was the Husky’s hot runner technology. Husky uses a dedicated series of time-proven Schottli gating technologies to ensure best-in-class plastic part quality, said Khatri.
The Schottli side gate technology ensures optimal part filling and allows for compact mould dimensioning and reliable scalability of up to 384 cavities per mould. Cluster gating such as the Schottli star side gate solution allows for much higher cavitation with smallest possible injection machines. It thereby delivers lower part cost due to highest productivity, he elaborated.
Khatri sketched the context in which the Schottli tooling technologies along with Husky’s proven hot runner offer great values to the its target applications of injection systems, infusion and transfusion, diagnostics and laboratory, and health and hospital care.
Getting into details, Khatri zeroed upon two of the applications for a comprehensive account – the syringe and the pipette tip.
Of syringes and pipette tips
With a clear upward global trend of 3.7% CAGR during the period 2019 to 2026, syringes are expected to hit 46 billion units by 2026. With 9 billion doses administered in 2021, COVID vaccination alone accounted for 22% of the total production in 2021. The markets driving the trend are Asia with over 50%, Europe 25% and North America 18%.
The pipette tip shows an even stronger market trend of 8.1% CAGR during the period 2020 to 2026 and is projected to reach 39.6 billion units by 2026 with the 2021-25 market data suggesting Europe, Asia-Pacific and North America splitting the market evenly between them.
This rising need for quality parts further accelerated by COVID and the localization needs driven by government measures to control the pandemic, opens up growth opportunities in syringe parts and pipette tips manufacturing.
Giving an overview of syringe parts, Khatri dwelt in great details on the main components of a syringe – the protector, the needle hub, the barrel and the plunger.
The protector comes with possibility of a multitude of safety design features including the re-use prevention mechanism. For the hub, the Husky’s solutions drawn from years of experience ensure highest efficiency in addressing the complexity arising out of the multitude of needle sizes. The barrel allows a variety of connection types like the luer slip, luer slip eccentric, luer lock and the fixed needles. The plunger can also include the stopper function.
The PP made protector and needle hub have up to 192+192 cavity mould and have seen over 10,000 and 9,000 cavities installed respectively. The PP, COC or COP made barrel and the PP or PE made plunger have 96+96 cavity mould and each witnessed over 13,000 cavities installed.
Khatri’s presentation with short video clips lucidly explained in great details all the technical aspects of the working of each of the components and highlighted the benefits of Husky’s superior solutions. Optimal mould cooling and the parts designed to give fastest cycle time and lowest part-weight are the clear winners in the market. Maximum thickness of wall enabled by optimal centring of core; fastest cycle time; compact mould size; and safe, reliable and easy to use features were highlighted by Khatri.
Giving an overview of the pipette tip, Khatri elaborated on the different type of tips like the filter tips and unfiltered tips and further classified them as micro tips, wide bore tips, gel loading tips and barrier tips among others. He differentiated the characteristics of pipette tips based on their typical length (35-175 millimetres), volume (1 to 10,000 micro litres) and bore (0.15-1.3mm)
He added authority to his presentation with a short video clip of a 64-cavity Schottli mould for a 30 microliter pipette tip running at the world’s fastest 56 seconds cycle time.
Addressing the critical quality requirement of tip concentricity, he talked of the solution developed by Husky that allowed for unique core strippering adjustment to positively influence concentricity of the pipette tips. This core alignment solution together with modular and simple mould concept allowed building mould for a wide range of pipette versions and cavitation.
He talked at length giving the pipette tip product details and optimization of tools before summarizing the benefits of pipette moulds.
The concentricity adjustment, the compact mould design, the lowest TCO (Total Cost of Ownership) and the fastest cycle time with unmatched reliability were some of the benefits he highlighted.
The webinar came to a close following a rigorous Q&A session where Khatri re-iterated, “All our medical moulds are designed and manufactured to ensure the highest ease of use and the lowest maintenance.”