Recommended Assembly Equipment

When assembling your printed package prototype, it can be as simple as double-sided tape or as involved as using several types of heat sealing equipment.

When purchasing heat sealing equipment, you want to look for a style that best duplicates the look of production methods.

Types of heat sealers:

Impulse Wire or Ribbon, seal/cut

Automatic Sealers, Impulse/Continuous

Hand Held Heat Sealers

Continuous Band Sealer

Heat Sealer Suppliers:

You can search Google for Heat Sealers and find dozens of suppliers and variations.  Below are a few of the companies we have used.

American International Electric Inc.  www.aieco.com

Technopack Corp.  www.technopackcorp.com

Uline:  www.uline.com

Amazon:  www.amazon.com

Impulse Wire sealers

There are 2 styles of wire type sealers, wire and ribbon wire.  The sealers use a thin metal wire or ribbon to melt together the 2 sides of the films. Typically, you see the thin wire seals on bread bags.  The ribbon seal works extremely well for sealing in zippers on pouches.  Available in 2mm or 5mm widths. 

Note: The wire impulse sealer does an acceptable job fusing the film when making bread bags, but the seams can pull apart if you do not let it melt together well.  To avoid burning out the element we removed the heat shield from over the wire to give it better melt/cutting ability.  It will prolong the life of the wire for sealing/cutting.  The wire can become charred with plastic after a while. Use a scotch bright pad to clean off any char marks on the wire when it is cool and unplugged. 

We have also used the ribbon sealer for bread bags, sealing a wider than needed edge and trimming it narrower.  This does give you a seam but it holds much better than the wire seal.

Automatic Sealers

This type of sealer is the real workhorse. You have temperature and sealing duration controls.  Available in 2 styles, Impulse and Continuous Heat.  They are available with automatic jaws operated by a foot switch or manual foot pedals.   We recommend the automatic models.  They have options such as 1 sided or 2 sided heating element.  We prefer the 2 sided. 

The Impulse sealer will give you a smooth seal with little or no patterning.  They are available in a variety of widths from 8” to 24” and larger.  The heat seal width is 5mm or 10mm wide.  We recommend the 10mm width.  If you need to make a wider seal, just seal it in overlapping bands.

The Continuous heat sealer is always on and uses heated metal bars.  They have similar features of the Impulse sealers but with a 5/8” sealing width.  Available with a cross hatch(waffle) pattern or smooth.  We use this style for wide top seals found on chip bag and heavy pouches.  If you need to make a wider seal, just seal it in overlapping bands.

Hand Held Heat Sealer

Also referred to as constant heat sealers because they are always on.  This style sealer is used more for finishing. Some models produce a crimped (ridged) pattern not found on other sealers.  Seal width is typically 12mm wide.

The sealer we bought from Uline works great for chip bags that require the crimped look.  Make your initial seal with an automatic sealer then re-seal with the crimper to create the pattern.

Continuous Band Sealer

This is a higher volume sealer.  If you need 50 to 100 or more the band sealer is an effective option for pouches of any kind.  Seal widths usually 10-12mm wide.

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Recommended Assembly Equipment

Eco-Solvent Package Prototyping Solution.
Prototyping & Proofing Films,
Inkjet Media Guide.