The not-to-be-missed appointment for the STARS magazine is with Fiorello Cenci, member of the Board of Directors of SIMEC S.p.A. and great expert in the ceramic and stone industry.
Mr. Cenci, as every year we are gathering your point of view on the developments of the ceramic field. What changes have been made in the last months and what are the new perspectives and trends?
Among the most significant novelties of the last period, I’d point out the tendency of several ceramic slab manufacturers to reinforce slabs, as it often occurs in the natural stone field. In a growing industry, such as the ceramic one, aiming to achieve even bigger and thinner surfaces (up to 3 mm), the main manufacturers are proposing slabs which are coupled and not, reinforced with nets or matting in order to get flexible, very resistant and safe products in case of accidental breakage of the material. The coupling of two slabs or their reinforcement on one side is performed by applying the reinforcement net/matting on the surface of the slab, using polyurethane or epoxy resins. SIMEC has rapidly intercepted customers’ needs and developed completely automatized systems for spraying resin and spreading the net/matting to reach a perfect adhesion. We are talking about state-of-the-art systems that can handle a slab per minute without any operator and without any waste of resin. Summing up, low resin consumption - high productivity and maximum reliability, features that allow to amortize the investment in a very short time.
What can you tell us more generally about the market trend of large-size ceramic slabs?
I’d start by saying that the market of large-size ceramic slabs is quickly growing: some years ago it was difficult to imagine to produce large size slabs… today it is normal to find on the market slabs of different thickness with surfaces of six square meters. The more the size of slabs increase, the more Simec feels at its ease thanks to its long tradition in processing large slabs of natural stone. The great experience in the ceramic field matured over years, together with the great know-how on the treatment of stone slabs has quickly put us in pole position among the suppliers of technology for handling, polishing, cutting and squaring SUPERSIZE materials.
Today we are on the market with a wide range of products which is highly competitive and consolidated with a growing number of Italian and international references. Our lapping machines are considered among the best in the world. For some time now we have been offering the ORBITAL technology in the ceramic sector, which is particularly suitable for achieving an even and without shadows polishing on large surfaces. Next to these polishing / lapping technologies we have added some machines for the superficial finishing, especially the SAP and SHINE models, developed to treat the surface of the material with special chemicals that are able to close the micro porosities of the surface and increase the gloss up to 30 degrees. This treatment makes the product resistant to stains and acid products such as lemon, cola, etc.
Have you made any strides in cutting and squaring as well?
Certainly, our products are constantly evolving to meet the growing market needs that seem to be more and more oriented to produce large slabs to have the possibility to cut them into smaller sizes according to the orders acquired. This approach gives manufacturers greater flexibility because it’s just on flexibility that the game is played; on the ability to meet the market’s needs in real time. Our automatic cutting machines, made up of machines with independent movement of cutting spindles, are among the most advanced and efficient ones and allow to cut slabs with thickness from 3 mm to 30 mm, in plunge-cut of step-cut mode.
For special shapes, we propose a wide range of numerical controlled bridge saws capable of making any kind of geometry either flat or not. As for squaring, we propose excellent machines capable of removing big quantity of material on each side of slabs. These machines have a special system for adjusting automatically the position of the calibrating spindles according to the quantity of material to be removed, with automatic detection of the tool wear.