Flexible Packaging Waxes
Waxes are added to the everyday paper products you use. Food packaging ranging from hamburger wrappers to frozen food packaging select paraffins and paraffin blends are used to impart properties such as moisture and grease barriers, gloss, and freshness seals.
IGI will be pleased to discuss with you the use of waxes in your specific packaging application. Please contact us and we will review with you available products.
Packaging Industry Overview
The general area of packaging includes a wide range of methods and materials that are generally grouped into smaller categories:
Folding types
Corrugated containers and folding cartons
Flexible types
Wrappers, labels, bags, sacks, and pouches
Rigid types
Bottles, jars, cans, drums and tubes
Paper and Paperboard Packaging
In all packaging applications, the package must contain and protect its products or contents. Depending on the product, these two major functions can take on a wide range of meanings. For example, paper and paperboard can be of greater value in their ability to contribute strength and stiffness or rigidity to a container. Plastics, glass and metals may also offer strength and stiffness, but paper is more resilient than glass and can be more resilient than plastic over a wider temperature range. Paper and paperboard can also be lighter and far more easily printed on than the other materials.
The only difficulty you run into with paper and paperboard is their low barrier properties. In most cases, paper and paperboard must be coated with waxes or plastics, or laminated to plastic films or foil to develop barrier capabilities to water, vapor, gases or odors.
The operations needed to convert paper and paperboard into packaging are numerous and complex. They consist primarily of machines that accept rolls or sheets of paper or paperboard and print, cut, fold and glue them into their final form. The demands on the web are therefore that it be capable of being fed through the machine and have the ability to be printed, glued and folded. Feeding problems are generally not caused by low strength, but stem from wrinkling and curling which is frequently traced back to moisture balance problems. Printing success depends on the printing process to be used. Folding includes both the ability to fold cleanly and straight, but only where the fold is wanted. Glueability is a difficult property to characterize since a wide range of adhesive types is used. Machines may require that the adhesive develop a quick tack to hold a folded carton together long enough to be loaded into a shipping container, or the adhesive may be dried completely very quickly.
Petroleum Wax Usage in the Packaging Industry
As previously mentioned paper and paperboard must be coated with waxes or plastics, or laminated to plastic films or foil in order to develop barrier capabilities to water, vapor, gases or odors. The four major industry segments in which petroleum wax and/or wax blends are used are as follows:
- Folding Cartons
- Corrugated Containers
- Flexible Packaging
- Paper Cups and Food Containers
The following is a summary of the many advantages wax offers to the packaging industry.
- Water Resistance and Water Vapor Resistance
Water and water vapor resistance is the most important property associated with paraffin wax in conjunction with paper. - Gas and Odor Barrier
In addition to good protection against moisture vapor, paraffin wax is a good barrier against odor and gas transmission. It is this property which protects products against loss of flavor and odor and from contamination by foreign odor. - Economy
Petroleum based waxes are very economical water-resistant materials and their low viscosity requires relatively minimal machinery cost for application at high speeds. - Purity
Many grades of petroleum based wax are food grade, tasteless and odorless.
In addition to these advantages, petroleum wax can be blended with other waxes and additives and/or physically modified via mechanical means to provide the following important properties in paper packaging:
- Heat Sealability
- Hot Tack
- Gloss and Gloss Stability
- Blocking
- Friction
- Scuff Resistance
- Grease Resistance
IGI can take specific needs of a customer, balancing the above properties to develop a custom blend for their process. Please take a moment to contact us regarding so we may review your specific application.
