Picariello Teloni, Even Smarter Welding with Leister

Author: Alberto Pecchio, Marketing Specialist, Leister Italy

Picariello Teloni is a company with a great tradition: founded in 1946 by the great-grandfather of the current owners, it has been producing tarpaulins and covers for vehicles for almost three quarters of a century. The headquarter of the company is in Battipaglia, in the province of Salerno, but Picariello Teloni has customers all over the national territory and also abroad.
In these years the company has definitely evolved: the small workshop of 20 m² / 215 ft² of the beginnings has been transformed over time into a plant of 3.000 m² / 32292 ft², with 16 employees and nine welding equipments.

More about Picariello Teloni

In addition to the growth in size, there has of course also been a technological evolution: if the first covers were made of canvas, since 1975 the company began to weld PVC, initially using high frequency welding machines.

A practical and convenient technology

Subsequently Picariello Teloni began to implement the welding of thermoplastic materials using technologies based on hot air. As Alessandro Picariello, one of the company's owners, explains: «Introducing new technologies takes time to become familiar with their characteristics, but once hot air welding machines were tried out, the operators no longer had any doubts about their validity and practicality, wondering why we had not adopted them before».

Over the last few years, several hot air welders have been purchased and in all cases the choice of Picariello Teloni was based on the solutions proposed by Leister.

Picariello Teloni, Leister and Arteca: history of a (long) cooperation

The first of the Leister solutions adopted by Picariello Teloni, thanks to the mediation of Arteca that has always distributed the products signed by the Swiss multinational in Italy, was UNIPLAN, chosen for its versatility and ability to perform multiple processes and weld different materials. Soon the first UNIPLAN was joined by another machine to meet the increased demand.

With the development of the  company, other Leister solutions have been bought by Picariello Teloni, like TAPEMAT SPRIEGEL, the ideal machine for efficient and fast welding of reinforcement belts for truck tarpaulins, which with a maximum productivity of 20 m/min / 65.6 ft/min is one of the fastest automatic belt welding machines on the market.

Subsequently, the company also purchased the HEMTEK ST welding machine, which is the ideal solution for the fastest and best quality edging of tarpaulins up to 12 cm / 4.72 in wide.
High productivity, excellent welding quality and easy to use of these machines led Picariello Teloni to have no doubts when it came to further expanding its fleet of machines: the company turned again to Leister.

The fleet of machines is completed

Knowing the company's needs well, Leister proposed to Picariello Teloni the purchase of the new UNIPLAN 500. The company already knew the old version of UNIPLAN and had appreciated its versatility; trying out the new UNIPLAN 500 he was able to verify that it is extremely eclectic, thanks to particular characteristics that make it ideal for many different processes in the same activity.

UNIPLAN 500 is perfect for welding truck tarpaulins (in addition to many other applications). In particular, it is the ideal welding machine for companies such as Picariello Teloni, where these activities are carried out frequently and on large surfaces, thanks to the characteristics of robustness and reliability that guarantee high and constant performance.

The excellent, improved

Alessandro Foce, Product Manager for Leister Technologies Italia, explains, «UNIPLAN 500 is equipped with a material lifting device lever that allows the operator to start welding faster. The insertion of the nozzle between the sheets to be welded is also made more immediate, making the work easier and safer. The drive roller is also sliding: this allows to avoid obstacles such as eyelets and fixing hooks. The on board electronics of the new welding machine- continues Foce - has been completely renewed and now allows to save the welding parameters. The maximum versatility that this innovation brings makes the machine perfect for realities that use different materials, where the production plan foresees the frequent passage from one material to another. Last but not least, the passage from one function to another - from the welding of coupled sheets to the creation of hems or flaps - is even faster. The delayed or accelerated start functions have also been introduced».

Once the ideal parameters have been identified for one type of material, switching to welding another is no problem: when it comes to rewelding the first material, a simple command is enough to recall the parameters from the UNIPLAN 500 memory and immediately obtain a perfect weld, without the need to proceed by trial and error or risk imperfections in the quality of the work. This naturally also applies to subsequent welds: the welding machine's large memory allows you to save the parameters of all types of welds carried out within the company and easily recall them when necessary.

Fully satisfactory results

The introduction of the new UNIPLAN 500 has allowed Picariello Teloni to complete the cycle of truck tarpaulins processing: now this can be carried out entirely in-house, right down to the last finish, quickly and with quality that meets the company's high standards. Picariello Teloni's fleet of machines thus completed brings the company to a considerable production capacity of over 1000 truck tarpaulins per year.

«Leister technology offers considerable advantages over high-frequency welding», concludes Alessandro Picariello; «it does not require the continuous presence of two operators, just one, with obvious positive effects on productivity. High frequency is still useful for certain types of work - out-of-standard or requiring special certifications - but the welds obtained with Leister machines now represent a new standard for us that satisfies us perfectly in terms of the time required and the quality of the results».