Sustainable advancements

Navis TubeTex’ investment in environmentally focused R&D has translated into a number of new advances in equipment and machinery. For example, the company has been working to develop and patent a unique system for applying steam to fabric, which Motchar said greatly reduces steam consumption. The three-year project has been in trials for more than a year, though the product has yet to be named.

 

“This is an item that – depending on where you are in the world, what your current steam cost is, what your particular running parameters are – the payback might be six to 12 months,” he said. “It means lower energy consumption, which is a hot-button issue for everyone.”

 

On the drying side, the company has developed and installed the e65 HRU (heat recovery unit), with the goal of reducing the amount of energy required in the drying or heat setting process. Used for all drying applications, the company also has added the equipment to competitors’ dryers.

 

The company has been working on another project on the wet finishing side, too, but Motchar said he isn’t ready to provide full details yet. It involves the dyeing process, which isn’t done with the company’s current product line, but the system has the potential to save water, chemicals and energy, he said.

 

Additionally – and similarly buttoned up for the time being – Navis TubeTex has developed a unique system for applying softener on the pad that significantly reduces the amount of softener used and moisture going into the dryer, he said. This amounts to chemical and energy reduction, and details will be forthcoming, he added.

 

Navis TubeTex also is in the early stages of developing continuous bleaching equipment that Motchar said will significantly reduce the amount of water, steam and power used.

 

The company has also made a push to improve its tenter frames, sold under its Marshall & Williams brand, though not necessarily for sustainable reasons, he said.

 

“This is a key product line for us and we believe it has a lot of potential beyond where it is now,” he said. “We have spent a lot of money updating the design of the machine and in CFD (computational fluid dynamics), which involves air flow and efficiency.”

 

Improving the tenter frames involved optimizing the nozzle configurations for blowing hot air out of fabrics, Dixon said. The company solicited an outside firm to find ways to improve the tenter frames.

 

“We thought our nozzles were pretty good and thought we should change some other things,” he said. “But when they started looking at it, the nozzles were changed more than any other piece of the machine. They were great before, but we made them better, along with the whole system.”

 

Also, Navis TubeTex has invented a unique way of finishing airbag production without a tenter frame, Dixon said, and is currently installing the first system for this purpose in the U.S.

 

The manufacturer has refreshed its other core products, as well, including tubular compactors, open-width compactors, pads and dryers. Much of the updates have been in the electronics and software areas, as well as on the aesthetics side.

 

“If you look at our core products, when our customers look at us vs. our competition, they believe we are on the leading edge,” Motchar said. “As an example, we have on our compactors software that can be monitored on an iPad, which allows you to troubleshoot or run these machines from anywhere.”

 

Great investment, bright future

All of these advances have created a bright future for Navis TubeTex, Motchar said, something he imagined when he bought the company from a private equity firm.

 

“It's worked out wonderfully so far,” he said. “And the market obviously has come back. It really started to come back in 2010, and 2011 was a really good year.

 

“We've seen a nice resurgence in the U.S., some of it added capacity, some of it new capacity and some of it updating new technology that is more cost efficient and more energy efficient,” he added. “It’s been a really nice pick-up.”

 

Motchar, who joined the company as vice president of sales in 1998, said he saw potential in the company after it had weathered the financial crisis and after some changes were made to its business model during the “Great Recession.” The biggest move was the decision to outsource most of its parts manufacturing, and most of those suppliers now are within a 20-mile radius of Lexington.

 

At its global headquarters, the company handles manufacturing as well as all corporate functions. Manufacturing now involves assembly mostly, as is the case with most capital equipment providers. And before it ships new machines, it powers them up and runs fabric through them for testing, Dixon said.

 

Motchar had the offices completely refurbished and updated after he bought the company, marking the first time any modernization had occurred here since the company moved from New York and built the building in 1989. Navis hired a number employees prior that year to help with the transition, and many of them are still with the company today, Motchar said.

 

Another differentiator is the company’s significant technical service structure throughout the world for rapid response, he added.

 

“That has obviously been a big benefit to the customers,” Motchar said. “We have people we have trained here who are certified technicians.”

 

“And it's not just the machinery – it's the process, too,” Dixon said. “We have to be and want to be process experts. We're not just selling metal because if we're just selling metal the Taiwanese and Chinese and Koreans are going to kill us because we can't sell metal like they can. It has to come with process expertise, throughout the production of the machinery, to the installation, to the after-sales service.”