Page 44 - TEXtalks International June/July-2025

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NTB’s business gets a full upgrade working width of 3.4 metres was installed to meet sourcing spare parts, most notably of the frequency

with unique Monforts MONTEX ever-increasing demand, but inevitably, the converters, had become increasingly difficult.
company’s forward momentum was set back
Updated system
somewhat as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic.
Monforts has subsequently installed new control
Despite a sudden 70% drop in sales, NTB was cabinets and Qualitex 800 technology to the two
nevertheless able to retain all its staff and in 2020 older MONTEX stenters at NTB, along with
founded Gorilla Protect GmbH, as a distributor of programmable logic controller (PLCs) process
advanced anti-viral face masks. visualisation and 24-inch TFT multi-touch colour
screens at the stenter frame infeeds.
Post-pandemic, regular business has resumed and
the company celebrated its 25th anniversary in 2024. The outfeed, padder and calender have further been
equipped with seven-inch touchscreen control
It is now in the process of a generational change, panels and all frequency inverters for the drives used
with Rainer Hurtz stepping back and management of to transport the textiles have been updated.
the company being transferred to his son Oliver as
Commercial Director, along with Technical Director Overall control is via a Siemens TIA 1500er F portal
Bastian Schreurs and Sales and Development and a Gateway server/client OPC/UA interface.
Manager Lampros Kampas.
“The clamping frames of the stenters are now
“I will accompany and support them as long as it equipped with the latest drive and control technology
makes sense,” says Rainer Hurtz. “The company’s as well as visualisation and thanks to the OPC-UA
goal has always been to understand how processes interface, data can now be read out directly from the
work and to continuously optimise them. As such, PLC and analysed by a customer’s EAP system,”
our current focus is on process data acquisition and explains Monforts Area Sales Manager Thomas
analysis, a high degree of digitalization, actively Päffgen. “Our machines are known for their
implemented quality management and the robustness and long service life, but the retrofitting of
introduction of an energy and occupational safety specific modules with new control and drive
The new management team at NTB (clockwise from top left): Rainer Hurtz, Bastian Schreurs, Lampros Kampas and Oliver Hurz.
management system. If you stop getting better, technology – going far beyond the basic replacement
As a highly specialised company with a focus on breathable membrane film laminations for you’ve stopped being good.” of spare parts – can have a significant impact on the
excellence in the provision of fabric coating and sportswear. performance of an existing line.”
finishing services, NOVA Textil-Beschichtung GmbH Digital affinity
(NTB) has recently benefited from an extensive “We had a great customer who was providing us with Technical Director Bastian Schreurs – who was NTB’s Quality
Monforts modernisation programme. so many orders that by 2005 we decided to order a first-ever trainee – has worked closely with Monforts “Our goal was to be able to produce all fabric orders
second MONTEX stenter, in a special configuration,” specialists on the modernisation project and is in full on any of the three MONTEX lines, and we naturally
NTB’s relationship with Monforts dates back to the explains managing director and founder Rainer agreement. chose Monforts for this project,” adds Bastian
company’s formation, with the 1999 installation of the Hurtz. “This also allowed us to enter the market for Schreurs. “We didn’t have to do anything
first MONTEX stenter at its plant in Grefrath, Germany blackout and digital printing fabrics.” “Our goal is to be able to offer a high level of quality mechanically apart from updating the safety devices,
– just 30 kilometres away from the Monforts HQ in and service, with our business under constant price which speaks volumes about the quality that
Mönchengladbach. At that time, the NTB team Another important development for the company was pressure from our Asian competitors,” he says. “We Monforts has been delivering to us for 26 years now. I
consisted of just three people at a 1,000 square its approval by the German Armed Forces see this modernisation project as an opportunity to would like to once again praise the Monforts service
metre site. (Bundeswehr) for the supply of vector protection further establish ourselves and thus retain our department headed by Volker Gingter and our own
clothing and equipment. NTB’s special finishing customers. It is also important to continue advancing workshop staff, because not only the scheduling, but
Twenty years later, by 2019, the company had grown technology is essential in shielding military personnel our digitalization, firstly, to better understand our also the implementation of this project was virtually
to a 40-strong workforce operating three MONTEX from insect bites and vector-borne diseases which processes, and secondly, to remain attractive as an seamless. It is very important for us to have
lines at two adjacent plants covering over 3,500 can be prevalent and deadly in many areas of the employer. Young people have a strong affinity for competent and always available partners and
square metres. NTB sales that year exceeded €8 world. In 2023, Germany’s Ministry of Defence digital things and while we can always buy the best unfortunately, as we have repeatedly experienced,
million for the first time. subsequently granted NTB an exemption for the machines, without well-trained specialists to operate this is not a given these days.”
processing of permethrin for its vector protection them, it’s impossible.”
Forward momentum services, in the interest of national defence. “We’ve had a great ongoing relationship with
NTB’s initial focus was on the coating of mainly glass He adds that the electronic controls of the two older Monforts from the beginning,” concludes Rainer
fibre fabrics and awnings and sun protection Covid-19 resilience MONTEX stenters particularly needed updating, as Hurtz.
products for outdoor furnishings, as well as In 2015, a third MONTEX production line with a

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