Trumpler Mexica finishing laboratory shows what it can do
On show on the Trumpler Mexicana SA stand at the recent Anpic fair in Leon, Mexico, were examples of leather finished at the company’s recently-opened finishing laboratory in the city.
At the new facility, lab technicians test the finishes on customer’s own leather for wear, flex, waterproofing, scratch and heat resistance and cracking. They can also supply the tanner with the correct formula to achieve the desired effects within a 24-hour period.
Built at a cost of $350,000, the laboratory offers services to Trumpler’s Mexican and Central American customers, with most of the chemicals sold by Trumpler coming from the Rotta Group in Germany and Trumpler, Spain, from where additional wet end and finishing technical support is provided. In Mexico, Trumpler handles dry and wet end chemicals, oils, dyestuffs, retanning agents and in-house products. Rotta produces caseins, pigments, acrylics, polyurethane resins and water-based top coats. No solvents are used in any of these products.
Offering 120 products for finishing leather, including wax finishes for sole leathers, Trumpler ships about 2,000 tonnes of chemicals to Mexico annually, up dramatically from the 400 to 500 tonnes of wet finishes in its earlier years. In its production of casein products, it uses distilled water, yet when it is testing tanning formulations for tanners it uses the same water as that used in tanneries. Over in Guadalajara, Trumpler maintains a wet end laboratory. No finishing is tested there, but the facility can be used to support that in Leon, the company says.
