Valmet Seal Strip Flex suction roll seal material

Valmet Seal Strip Flex* is the brand name for Valmet’s suction roll seals. It is used as a standard seal material in our new suction rolls and as a replacement of the conventional seal strip materials in existing rolls. Valmet Seal Strip Flex is a cost-efficient suction roll seal strip material that delivers premium quality and performance. The material is based on rubber graphite, but includes some special components resulting in beneficial properties for a seal strip such as flexiblity, excellent wear resistance and low noise properties.

Development history

Valmet started development of the seal strip flex already in 1997 and full-scale production was started in the early 2000’s. Further development enabled the modernization of the manufacturing method and investments on the cost-effective production was made during 2006. The manufacturing is carried out with an efficient and modern extrusion method. Seal strip flex is completely manufactured in-house, all the way from rubber mixing to vulcanization and machining. This enables continuous research and product development work.

Typical applications

Valmet Seal Strip Flex is suitable for suction rolls in paper, board and tissue machines as well as pulp drying lines, and it can be used at all suction roll seal positions:

• Pneumatically-loaded axial seals
• Valmet Seal Strip Lock** constructions
• Spring-loaded end seals
• Suction rolls originally made by another manufacturer

Valmet Seal Strip Flex offers the customer many benefits

Seal strip flex has all the properties required to give superior performance over to the traditional rubber-graphite offerings. In addition to that, the product’s formulation is substantially better in the areas of wet and dry wear. With seal strip flex, customers have even doubled seal life and thus the need for maintenance and roll changes has noticeably decreased. Flexible material conforms to the shell surface better and faster, resulting in rapid achievement of vacuum level. The superior handling characteristics of this material eliminates worries about breakage in handling and mounting. Traditional seal strips are delivered in long transport packages and freight costs can be very high. Seal strip flex can be coiled into small quadratic delivery boxes, which saves on freight.

Hundreds of customers all over the world are already using seal strip flex in their suction rolls. Due to mod-ern and cost-efficient manufacturing, We can take care of customers’ seal strip deliveries for entire machine lines, or even mill sites. Contract customers can reduce their stock values as Valmet guarantees fast delivery for contract items.

Savings for customers’ procurement

• Premium product, with competitive pricing based on efficient manufacturing and large volumes
• Wear resistant, premium material with a long life
• Fast delivery for Valmet standard seals and contract items, logistic centers in Europe, Asia Pacific and North America

*earlier known as FlexSeal
**earlier known as LocSeal