Tobacco cutter KT 2up & KT 3

Maximized machine availability

Increased cutting precision

Improved filling power

Less dust

Significantly quieter production

Continual availability of spare parts

TECHNOLOGY WITH HIGH CUSTOMER VALUE

For more than 170 years, the Luxembourg family business Heintz van Landewyck has been producing and selling tobac-co products across the globe. Over the years, Landewyck has relied on Hauni, the world's largest supplier to the tobacco industry, for its Primary technology. The German company is currently impressing the long-standing Luxembourg company by successfully upgrading two of its tobacco cutters.

The Landewyck group has close to 1,800 employees

and is headquartered in the Luxembourg neighbourhood

of Hollerich, site of one of its two Luxembourg factories.

The second is in Ettelbrück, 30 kilometres away.

The company also has production facilities in Germany,

Hungary, Andorra and Gran Canaria.

Together, the factories produce more than eight billion

cigarettes, eight billion tubes and 5,000 tons of rolling

tobacco per year, and export their products to more than

40 countries.

THE OLD HOMELANDNew location in

The company headquarters in Hollerich, lo-cated in one of Luxembourg's first Art Deco buildings, is surrounded by a large park with old trees and a historic swimming pool, which the employees and their families can use – even on weekends. This is just one example of the importance that Landewyck, one of the largest employers in the region, places on the well-being of its employees and a familial working atmosphere.

But while the ambience is idyllic, the logistics are com-

plicated. Dispersed across the company's 6.3 hectare

premises in Hollerich are its Primary processing,

Secondary production, in-house printing department

for cardboard packaging as well as its raw tobacco and

finished goods warehouses. Filters, on the other hand,

are produced in Ettelbrück, where Secondary production

also takes place. "We have to move some pallets up to

twelve times", explains Aloyse Metzen, Head of Primary

at Landewyck since 2006, about the logistical effort. The

road network is also everything other than optimal for the

many daily lorries. "An industrial site in the middle of a

city is no longer contemporary due to noise and emission

levels", says Metzen.

All that will soon change: brought on by the plans of the

City of Luxembourg to revive its tram network, whose

rails are to run through the company premises in a few

years' time, Landewyck has decided to consolidate its

two locations, Hollerich and Ettelbrück, in Erpeldingen/

Sauer near Diekirch. The relocation is scheduled to be

completed in two phases by 2020 – first Secondary and

Packaging will move to the new site and then Primary will

follow approximately two years later.

The invested amount is around 60 million euros. "As a

family business, we are deeply rooted in Luxembourg.

Since the Grand Duchy belongs to our company's foun-

dation, investing in securing our future in Luxembourg

goes without saying", states Georges Krombach, Head

of Marketing and a direct descendent of the company's

founder, Jean-Pierre Heintz. "In so doing, we aim to opti-

mize our productivity further in order to maintain our mar-

ket share and enter new markets for continued growth."

According to Metzen, Head of Primary, the company

wants to use the new site to "improve work processes

and ergonomics, increase the level of automation, boost

efficiency, optimize infrastructure connectivity and

prepare for possible modernization and expansion in the

future." In the process, Landewyck is actively involving its

employees in the design of the new location and prepar-

ing them for the future by offering opportunities to retrain

and obtain additional qualifications.

"Improve work processes and ergonomics, increase

the level of automation, boost efficiency, optimize

infrastructure connectivity and prepare for possible

modernization and expansion in the future."

COMPETITIVENESSHigh tech for

For Landewyck, an innovative, high-ly automated plant and machine park is an essential prerequisite to ensure competitiveness at the high-est level.

The plants in Luxembourg can reach a peak production

of 45 to 50 million cigarettes per day. This achievement

can in part be attributed to several KT 2 tobacco cutters

from Hauni, which cut tobacco mixtures with a cutting

width of 0.8 to 1.0 millimeters. "When Hauni brought an

upgrade to its reliable cutter on the market, it immediately

piqued our interest", reports Metzen, who has worked for

Landewyck over the last 19 years.

"Since we regard optimal technical equipment as funda-

mental to our success, we have decided to upgrade two

KT 2s and have fared quite well with regard to tobacco

and cost savings as well as improvements to quality."

The conventional KT 2 has a knife advance generated

by a gear unit, which advances and grinds the knives

automatically – regardless of whether or not it is neces-

sary. In contrast, the KT 3 sharpens the knives depend-

ing on their level of wear, just like the KT 2 upgrade. After

the upgrade, the KT 2up has the same functions as the

KT 3 in other respects as well, and can grind the knives

sharper than the KT 2. For both, Hauni engineers replace

the mechanical knife advance with an individual drive.

This drives the advance of the knives flexibly. The grinder

unit is also equipped with individual drives that can be

assigned the optimal parameters for the given blend. "We

can therefore set the machine exactly to the specific re-

quirements of a tobacco type and to our production", ex-

plains Metzen, who, by his own admission as an energy

engineering graduate, enjoys working with the intricacies

of technology. The advantages of the new cutter design

are obvious for Uwe Bausch, a development engineer at

Hauni: "The knives now last longer and are sharper than

in the previous model. They not only have to be replaced

less often but they also save on personnel resources and

increase the machine's availability. The grinding wheel

can even be replaced within a few minutes during a short

stop in production. Moreover, the operator can continu-

ally monitor the sharpness of the knives and set the blend

parameter or use the saved recipe parameter."

Metzen states that while providing exact statistical

evidence of the improvements is difficult, "across all

influencing factors, the improvements themselves leave

no doubt." These also include the filling power and

consequently the cigarette quality. The tobacco cutters

were set to the ideal operating point for Landewyck,

i.e. the best possible tobacco quality when taking into

account the longest possible service life for consumable

parts. Comparatively, the knives last up to four times

longer, the grinding wheels up to three times longer. If the

consumable materials have to be replaced, the upgrade

will save 30 percent of the time needed for the knives

and 20 percent of the time needed for the wheels. Even

the grinding procedure has improved considerably. The

sharper, cleanly ground knives provide even more ben-

efits to the production process: less dust is generated,

fewer unwanted grinding products end up in the cigarette

tobacco, the cutting precision increases and the machine

is significantly quieter.

"Since we regard optimal technical equipment as

fundamental to our success, we have decided to

upgrade two KT 2 and have fared quite well with

regard to tobacco and cost savings as well as

improvements to quality."

Hauni carried out the upgrades right there on

Landewyck's premises. For the first KT 2up, the plant

remained in the production line; for the second, the

upgrade was carried out in the in-house workshop.

Landewyck makes a point of involving its own employ-

ees in every plant conversion. "Since our people have

to know how the machines work in order to operate

and maintain them optimally, the Hauni specialists have

trained our technicians, who will look after the machines

later on", explains Metzen, who is not only the Head of

Primary but also responsible for Technical Service.

Generally, Hauni also performs upgrades on the KT 2 to-

bacco cutter in subsidiaries worldwide. All parts that are

not used in the knife unit or switch cabinet can then be

maintained as well. "This guarantees that the top results

that we strive for are achieved in practice", says Bausch.

"Moreover, the upgrade solves the problem that suitable

spare parts are becoming increasing difficult to procure

due to the fact that some manufacturers have discontin-

ued lines of products installed in the KT 2."

UPGRADESTailor-made

In the course of the upgrade, the

knife unit, knife drum, grinding unit

and switch cabinet are replaced.

Depending on the age, condition

and customer requirements for the

machine, Hauni specialists devise a

customized upgrade.

"We decided to make the investment since we knew from

our experience with the KT 2 update that we would im-

prove our production with the new KT 3 with regard to

machine performance, flexibility, plant availability, efficacy

and quality of the cut tobacco", said Metzen. The sophis-

ticated technology in the KT 3 contains many improve-

ments. At the same time, the machine's operation has

become easier, since the KT 3 is more accessible than its

predecessor and is therefore easier to clean and main-

tain. The new digital tobacco cutter fits perfectly into the

"intelligent factory" of tomorrow. "We have had a high level

of automation in our production for a long time now", re-

ports Metzen. Automated data acquisition ensures that

the energy consumption of a plant, the tobacco recipes

used or other machine settings can be called up and

controlled with the press of a button. The interaction of

man and machine belongs to day-to-day production.

"It is our job to look closely at which aspects of 'Industry

4.0' make sense for us and which don't", says Metzen.

"The goal of every type of network is to optimize process-

es. At our company, a robot can handle the boxes and

make the lives of our employees easier. But total automa-

tion is not possible." After the successful introduction of

SAP at the beginning of 2017, implementing the SAP MII

module – Manufacturing Integration and Intelligence – will

further improve data acquisition and network connec-

tions between the production plants. "The bidirectional

transmission of data involved with the intelligent factory

poses new challenges to plant manufacturers such as

Hauni", says Metzen. "They must provide an open and

yet secure interface."

KT 3 TOBACCO CUTTERNew

In addition to the two upgrades,

Landewyck has also invested in a

completely new KT 3 tobacco cut-

ter that cuts a broad spectrum of

tobacco types, from leaf tobaccos

to sensitive semi-oriental tobacco

through to 100 percent recon.

"We decided to invest in the KT 3 because we knew

from our experience with the KT 2 upgrade that we

would improve our production with regard to machine

performance, flexibility, plant availability, efficacy and

quality of the cut tobacco."

1847 Jean-Pierre Heintz founds a tobacco factory

with a shop at the age of 25 in the centre of

the City of Luxembourg. He names the com-

pany after his wife, Joséphine van Landew-

yck, since Dutch tobacco has an outstanding

reputation.

1897 Joseph Heintz, son of Jean-Pierre Heintz,

starts up a new factory at a site in the Hol-

lerich neighborhood in close proximity to the

central station, which is still the heart of the

company. There, 250 employees produce

100,000 to 300,000 cigarettes per week.

1925 Landewyck founds a second site

in Trier.

1939 Landewyck takes over the smoking tobacco

and snuff company "Fixmer" in Ettelbrück

and becomes a company with limited liability

(GmbH). The first big cigarette brand from

Landewyck is Africaine. Over the subsequent

decades, famous brands such as Maryland,

Lexington, Kent, Newport, Ducal, Bentley,

Elixyr, Che, Austin and Maya followed.

1951 Landewyck establishes a subsidiary in

Belgium.

LANDEWYCK'S HISTORY

1964 In Ettelbrück, a second factory

in Luxembourg is inaugurated.

1996 From now on, the branch office in Trier oper-

ates as an independent company with limited

liability (GmbH).

2003 The Landewyck Group S.à r.l. is founded, which

manages the business and is chiefly responsible

for corporate strategy and development.

2009 Foundation of Landewyck France.

2012 Foundation of Landewyck Spain.