News Story

A new winding concept is making industrial doors quiet and virtually maintenance-free

Lawrenceville, GA - A special CONTI® POLYFLAT belt from ContiTech, dispenses with the high speed door components most prone to wear – hinges and chains, for example.

It really takes no more than a maladroit steering maneuver, a poorly balanced forklift load or just the usual hustle and bustle of operations: collisions with rollup doors at busy door openings are a frequent occurrence in day-to-day industry. The speed of a rolling door is, of course, an important factor in minimizing risks like this, for the faster a rollup door opens and closes, the smoother the material flow is likely to be. But speed is by no means the whole story. What use is the quickest door in the world if it stops working properly the first time something runs into it? As soon as guiderails or hinges are bent or worn, the financial loss incurred for repairs and downtime often cancels out the savings gained by using fast-action roll-up doors.

No More Wear Parts

Now Albany Door Systems has come up with a way to get around the use of hinges and has integrated this innovation into its new RapidRoll 3000 high speed rollup door. The RapidRoll 3000 high speed door opens at a speed of close to 2.5 meters per second, even in the case of larger size models. The individual slats on this fast-action rollup door are screwed directly onto a polyurethane flat belt that functions not only as a drive element but simultaneously as a "guide" as well. "The fact that the slats are suspended on the support strap without the use of any hinges gives our roll-up door a high degree of elasticity. Because of this, the force emanating from a collision is dispersed rather than impacting totally on the door structure.  In this way we are able to minimize the likelihood of a collision resulting in expensive and costly downtime," explains Friedhelm Frede, product developer at Albany Door Systems.  While a conventional rollup door employing hinges or chains can usually move neither forwards nor backwards after a head-on collision, the belt allows for torsional movements of up to around 90 degrees. Damaged slats can thus be replaced quickly and easily, thereby ensuring the functionality of the door as a whole. This is thanks in part to the high degree of flexibility the CONTI® POLYFLAT drive belt offers. With its special characteristics, the polyurethane belt is the kind of product that squares a circle: rigid, fixed and stable in operation, it displays ample flexibiliy in the event of a collision.

Since each individual slat is screwed to the center of the belt employing a special technique, it was necessary to completely redesign the drive belt to ensure that the bore hole through the belt neither damages the belt’s tensile members nor causes them to shift position during operation. The ContiTech Power Transmission Group modified the CONTI® POLYFLAT drive belt with this in mind, creating a special design with tensile-member-free zones. The bore hole for the slat holder is positioned exactly in these zones. Thomas Winkler, product developer for PU belts at the ContiTech Power Transmission Group, came up with the special product design that does the trick. "Various production parameters are coordinated to achieve a perfect combination of PU and steel wire that allows for tensile-member-free zones.“ The utmost  precision is then required for manufacture, since only an absolutely exact maintenance of the distance between zones with tensile members and zones without can ensure that the bore hole is set at just the right spot. The result: "Even after millions of cycles with large winding radii, the ContiTech belt still shows absolutely no sign of length extension. This helps ensure the longevity of our doors," explains Albany product developer Friedhelm Frede.

The direct slat-belt connection has many advantages beyond ease of disassembly and the speed at which parts can be replaced. Since the slats are connected to the belt via a clamping plate, virtually every single slat has its own wind anchor.  This renders even larger doors or doors subjected to strong winds extremely stable.

New Winding Concept Provides Contact-free Movement

The top ends of the belts are connected to new winding modules that allow for contactless door winding. To achieve this, the individual slats are rolled onto as many as three spiral roll tubes without touching one another.  Opening and closing is therefore frictionless and quiet. This, too, renders the door practically maintenance-free.  In prolonged testing, Albany Door Systems ran the industrial high speed door practically non-stop out in the open and exposed to frost, rain and extreme heat – with no detrimental effects to either the running performance or functionality. "The anodized surfaces of the slats are insulated from one another in such a way that condensation and rainwater cannot collect on them," explains Friedhelm Frede.

The interplay of the polyurethane belt with a particularly powerful ACS 80 frequency converter control system ensures the superb running action of the entire door. This is further enhanced by permanently effective door panel tensioning. A range of protective features, moreover, ensures the highest possible level of safety.  "The patented, forward safety light barrier on the main closing edge is particularly impressive," according to Frede. "It replaces the highly interference-prone contact rails normally used." The light barrier contactlessly stops the door in the event of any disruption and causes it to reverse direction.

The Intelligent Alternative

Collision damage and its consequences are an important factor that has to be taken into consideration in calculating the cost of a door. As collisions can never be completely ruled out, however, the RapidRoll 3000 rollup door, nominated for the HermesAward 2004 innovation prize at the Hanover Trade Fair, is an intelligent and cost-effective alternative. It makes sure that an inattentive steering movement or a poorly positioned load does not end up costing operators an arm and a leg.  

About ContiTech

ContiTech AG, Hanover, with a worldwide workforce of around 24,000 employees, posted sales of nearly EUR 2.1 billion in 2004. ContiTech is a division of Continental AG, one of the world's top automotive components suppliers, with a workforce of around 81,000 and sales of EUR12.6 billion in 2004.

About Albany Door Systems

Albany Door Systems invented the RapidRoll fabric door in the late 1960s. This revolutionary high-speed roll up door became the benchmark that started the industrial high speed rolling door industry.

Today, Albany Door Systems is the global leader in the high speed and high speed industrial door market. Albany Door Systems manufactures custom door solutions for a variety of interior and exterior door applications and industries such as Cold Storage, Food Manufacturing, Access Control and Security, Parking Facilities, Heavy Equipment Storage, Waste Management, Utilities, Airports, Fire Stations, Post Offices, Beverage and Dairy Plants, Pharmaceutical Manufacturing, and Environment Protection to name a few. Albany Door Systems helps organizations lower maintenance costs, increase operational savings and enhance workflow, with reliable products and dependable service and maintenance. Visit http://www.albanydoorsystems.com/ Note to editors: Trademarks and registered trademarks referenced herein remain the property of their respective owners.

Media Contact
Joe Aiken
Albany Door Systems
770-338-5019