Freudenberg Medical, a global developer and manufacturer of medical devices, components, and minimally invasive solutions, has developed a ground-breaking new technology to continuously measure the inner geometry of silicone tubes. The new technology significantly increases product quality for high precision applications, such as pacemaker lead insulation, and dramatically cuts down on material usage and process time.
Freudenberg’s innovative measurement system is called Helix iMC™ and it stands for inner measurement and control. The technology is unique to the medical device market and is specifically designed for medical silicone extrusion. Helix iMC uses sensor technology to continuously measure the inner geometry of extruded products such as single- or multi-lumen IDs, wall thickness, or concentricity as an inline process.
“Until now, it was not possible to measure the ID of silicone tubing without making manual cuts at various cross sections, usually an off-line process,“ said Dr. Max Kley, President of Freudenberg Medical. “Now with our innovative Helix iMC technology, we offer customers more efficiency – better control, continuous processing, and less scrap – for an overall increase in quality and a significant cost savings.“
Customers benefit from continuous data monitoring across a complete production run without interruption and sample cuts, resulting in reduced validation time in order to get new products to market faster. For critical medical devices it is highly beneficial to 100% control and document every critical dimension throughout an entire production run and not only on a sample basis.
About Freudenberg Medical
Freudenberg Medical is a global partner for the design, development and manufacture of innovative medical devices, components, and product solutions. With 11 manufacturing operations and more than 1,500 associates worldwide, Freudenberg Medical offers a wide range of capabilities from high precision silicone and thermoplastics components and tubing to coatings, hypotubes, and subassemblies for catheters and minimally invasive devices. www.freudenbergmedical.de
