Choosing an insulation blowing machine is a lot like choosing bathing suits. “One size fits all” really isn’t the best approach. If you buy a machine that’s too small, it seriously restricts your business. On the other hand, one that’s too large raises operating costs and can get away from you.

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Watch our video and read on to see how you can choose the right equipment for the job — and find your perfect fit — every time.

DECIDE THE TYPE OF WORK YOU WANT TO DO

Let’s say your focus is small retrofits. As a home performance company, you will be crawling in and out of tight spaces, air sealing, and addressing many different concerns — including insulation.

In that case, pulling up a box truck with a gas-powered 100 bag per hour machine is overkill. You’ll need to dial back the machine so much that you’ll barely use it. Plus, getting the vacuum in and out of the box truck is a bigger challenge than with a small trailer.

On the other hand, if your focus is filling the ceilings on a three-story, multi-family building, a small 12-18 bag per hour machine could take up to five times as long. All profit from the job would be eaten up by labor due to the delay. Your production rate would slow down other trades and put you and the superintendent at odds.

The type of work you want to do will help you determine the best insulation blowing machine for the type of contracts you’re taking.

LEARN ABOUT THE DIFFERENT BRANDS

Becoming familiar with the best cellulose insulation blowing machine brands makes it easier for you to choose the right fit when the time comes. Popular brands include:

• IDI Distributors
• Accu1
• CertainTeed
• Cool Machine
• Heat Seal
• InsulMaxx
• Intec
• Krendl

CONSIDER IMPORTANT QUESTIONS

After you decide the type of work you intend to do, there are more things to consider:

• If you are using electric machines, will your job sites have a power source that you are allowed to access? Do you have a generator just in case?
• If you’re going gas-powered, what size do you need, and what equipment goes along with it?
• How much maintenance is required, and who will maintain it? What about service and parts?
• What will it take to get it up and running, and is it available in one day or two weeks?

Be sure to institute a daily process or S.O.P. to ensure the insulation blower parts are maintained, working at maximum efficiency, and ready to go.

Cordless or remote?

Remotes are another important worksite consideration. Most machines come with a corded remote, but wireless is a very convenient option. They work beautifully unless something happens to them. Going wireless is a good idea, but get the corded option too. Always have a backup.

Maintain Your Equipment

It’s important to have an insulation blower maintenance kit. You never know when the seals may need to be replaced, so you should be prepared. In this kit, always have dry lubrication for chains ready to go. If your crew sprays the chains with WD40, it will just coat them with dust from the fiberglass or cellulose. Keeping chains moving smoothly is essential, so be sure to have a plan.

Once you get a machine, wax the hopper. It only makes sense that the product will glide over the surface better if you give it a boost by waxing the hopper. If you need assistance with this type of maintenance, contact your local rep about scheduling a visit from one of our techs.

Consider how much you plan to install in a day. A 26’ box truck with a machine mounted in it can hold up to 200 bags of product. A 16’ trailer can’t touch that.

Buying Options: Comparing Insulation Blowing Machines

With all of this in mind, let’s look at the different types of blown-in insulation machine available for purchase:

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ENTRY-LEVEL ELECTRIC AND PORTABLE INSULATION MACHINES

• Cost: $5,000-$10,000
• Easy to move in and out of truck or trailer
• Small footprint (doesn’t take up much room)
• They blow 10-25 bags of fiberglass or 60-70 bags of cellulose per hour
• Good for 5-10 jobs per week, possibly 4 attics per day
• Smaller hose (3”)
• Minimal hopper capacity — half to one bag at a time
• Great for high rise construction where work requires moving machine from location to location

Mid-level machines

• $10,000-$18,000
• Gas or electric — normally truck or trailer mounted
• 30-60 bags of fiberglass per hour
• 120-150 bags of cellulose
• Larger hoses (4”)
• Larger hoppers can hold up to 4 bags
• 6-10 jobs per day

HIGH VOLUME INSULATION MACHINES (large gas, diesel, or PTO)

• $18,000-$40,000
• Volumes of 60-100 bags of fiberglass plus
• 200-240 bags of cellulose
• Can do up to 15-20 jobs per day
• Much larger or extended hoppers can hold up to 8+ bags on a standard hopper and 10+ on the extended hopper

Learn more about our insulation machine offerings here.

The reputation of the blow moulding machine manufacturer you do business with has a lot to do with the quality of the equipment it sells. The right company takes great pride in offering its customers top-of-the-line products at a competitive price. Buying a blow moulding machine can be a nerve-racking experience for fresh entrepreneurs.

There are countless specification, capability and price factors to be considered. This blog sets out to help anyone who wants to buy a blow moulding machine but does not know where to start. If you are in the market for a blow moulding machine, the following checklist will help you with the selection process.

While selecting a manufacturer you should consider:

• Experience and Knowledge – When talking to a blow moulding machine manufacturer, you want to feel 100 per cent confident the representative has extensive knowledge about each specific product. Especially if you have never purchased this type of equipment before, you will have a lot of questions. Make sure you identify a company that understands the industry and knows its product line. The manufacturer should be mature enough with great experience and expertise like CMP blow moulding machines.
• Capabilities – Also on the checklist is a manufacturer’s capabilities. In other words, select a company that has equipment specific to your needs. Because of the unique differences of one blow moulding machine to another, you must do business with a company that can accommodate you. When looking at manufacturers, you should consider both your current and future needs. That way, you can establish a business relationship with one source regardless of the required equipment for your operations.
• Qualifications – You need to know the company you choose has the right qualifications, including having a team of designers, engineers, and various other technical experts. Since those individuals play a critical role in the development of the equipment, their expertise is crucial. Even the sales team should have expertise in the blow moulding industry.
• Advanced Design – Both the type and quality of machines differ among blow moulding machine manufacturers. Instead of ending up with outdated equipment, work with a company that sells the most advanced designs. With that, the machinery will operate flawlessly, producing superior quality products fast and efficiently.
• Customer Support – There are not enough words to express how important it is to conduct business with a manufacturer that has professional and dedicated support staff. When you have a question or an issue arises, you want to know that someone will contact you quickly. Especially if a machine becomes inoperable, downtime affects production and consequently, generated revenue.
• Different Brands – Something else to add to your checklist when researching manufacturers of the blow moulding machine offers the top brands. Although there are many possibilities, working with a company that sells all sorts of material products is to your advantage. Always be aware of non-branded machines and replica manufacturers as they do sell the machine at cheap prices but are short term machines.
• Superior Quality Machines – Checking the safety and technology performance and if there is any abrasion or damage on the machine appearance in the machine-testing. Quality itself is in two sections – machine built quality & product (container) quality. The product quality depends on your end-user. The machine built quality affects the maintenance cost and breakdown cost of the plant. Not all blow moulding machine manufacturers are the same. Unfortunately, some make strong claims yet fail to deliver. At CMP, we provide our customers with state-of-the-art equipment. We also stand behind every product sold.
• High-Cost Performance – This is a key point of blow moulding machine selection. We choose machines not to ignore product performance to save money. You’d better choose one with high-cost performance. Many customers feel a heartbeat at the sight of low prices. The result shows that most of them suffer losses. Because the supplier channel is different, the supplier is good, of course, the cost will be high. But you’ll save trouble because the machine has less trouble, more power saving. You spend less energy on the machine. In the long run, you’ll save money.
• After-Sale Service – You need to know the after-sale service offered by the supplier. This will guarantee your benefits, avoiding unnecessary losses and effects. An after-sales clerk can finish all operations of installation and debug. We also provide door–to–door service if you need it. Perfect after-sale service can reduce the losses as far as possible and get a professional solution.
• A Good Mould Manufacturer – For any plastic moulding project, the mould building is the most expensive and time-consuming part of it. It does not allow you to try and see. This means you must choose the right mould manufacturer from the beginning, otherwise, it will be too costly to change suppliers later. There are numerous amount of mould manufacturers, some are big with a lot of manufacturing capabilities, some are one-man shops that only do simple machining and final assembly in house. However, this is not very important, compared to other manufacturing, the personal knowledge and experience of the mould maker play a more important role in mould making.

While Selecting a machine you should consider:

• What product I’m going to run on the machine?

I should know the exact requirements about the size, capacity, shape, weight, average output, etc of the product that I wish to produce, I shall offer this information to the supplier and they can provide me with the economic efficiency blow moulding machine selection plan. This is a pretty good choice. I will better have a certain relevant knowledge reserve before selecting a machine. It’s convenient to make a rational judgment according to my actual situation. The most important spec is the mould size of the machine. The range of products I want to produce should be matching the model. For this, I have to refer to the maximum mould size mentioned in the machine specification chart.

• What is my desired production?

First I need to know my production requirement, then I have to find out whether I need a Single station or Double station machine. Later, I have to analyse, if at a time only one product needs to be produced or more i.e no. of cavities such as 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 or 7 for huge productions. Estimating that my production capacity is required like containers per month and cross-check with the machine supplier whether this can be met. It is advisable to keep a 25% extra capacity. Considering my production, the OEM will suggest to me the extruder size, plasticizing capacity and possible cycle time of the machine.

• How much I’m going to spend on electric consumption?

According to my product and production, the machine which I’m selecting should be economic in power consumption. For additional power-saving, I must ask OEM for additional features for it.

• Do I need a continuous or accumulator die head?

Depending on my product I must see whether I have to go for continuous or accumulator parison die head.
To know more about the difference between both go to the link below:
https://arwagroup.in/cmp/blog/what-are-the-2-types-of-extrusion-blow-moulding-machines/

• Do I need auto deflashing or not?

Here the product is automatically deflashed or trimmed in the attachment of the machine. A fully ready container will come out of the machine. If the deflashing option is not present, every product (container, bottle etc) have to be trimmed by an operator manually. So, I guess auto deflashing saves a lot of time.

• Does my product need a parison controller?

A parison control system helps to improve product quality and reduce flash waste. This will be useful for me if my products are large containers. I shall go for Parison Controller if I have a critical product where I need constant wall thickness.

• Which PLC will be best for me?

To have a good knowledge of automation, first I need to know which PLC will be best for my use. The machine automation can be done by a PLC control or by a wired relay logic (this become outdated because of the limitations and bulkiness of the control panel). The PLC control has a very wide range of options available. This can be from ordinary custom-built microprocessor controllers to industrial-grade established control systems like MOOG, B&R, Beckhoff and so on. While selecting a PLC I must see what new features the OEM offers and the advantages of it as well.

• What additional features will I need for my product?

I need to know what other things are important for the machine. Selection of auxiliary like an air compressor, scrap grinder, the cooling system, moulds etc.

That’s all.

In a word, we must avoid being blind when we make blow moulding machine selection. Must base on actual production requirements. Measure and think about it prudently. Thus, reduce the cost and expand benefits. At Central machinery & plastic products, we help you to select the best CMP blow moulding machines so that you get the best out of your investments.