How Duck Tape is Made

in stony point north carolina
Duck brand factory makes over a million miles of the sticky stuff every year
to manufacturing they start with three main ingredients
basically duct tape is made up of three main components
the adhesive, the cloth, and the film
the adhesive starts with natural rubber
comes out of rubber trees much like maple syrup comes up maple trees
they send it to us in this big bulk
bales and then we begin the processing, the second component is the cloth
Much like a medical gals you’ll see in your house
that’s what gives duct tape its strength, the third component then of duct tape is the water proof
backing
much like a polly tarp you can find around your house
it's made out of a based plastic
you can add various color concentrates that give your base color this one would
give you your natural silver but you can add other color concentrates that would get you
the blue
Or a yellow
and you can even print the film to get these nice patterns
the process begins with making the adhesive at a machine called the
banberee
they mix the gooie rubber with the sticky resin until it’s about the consistency
of a pizza dough
then it is fed into the sigma where it’s heated
and mixed some more
as you can see it’s a lot like taffy
very stretchy but it’s very sticky now
with the adhesive done
we’re ready to make the roles, we’re going to take the cost trim here, and the poly film here, we’re going to un wine them together
and send it through the cavalry unit, at that point the adhesive is applied, put the cloth to the film core to make a nice tight bond
now you got duct tape
the tape is initially made into one giant roll
and there you go, now you have the tape
and really is there anything better than a big ol’
role of duct tape
to get to the size you’re familiar with
the rolls of sliced into strips and re-rolled
this is our converting operation now were going to take that big roll of duct tape we saw earlier
and then we're going to cut it down into the rolls
that you’re use to seeing it in the store
there's a lot of these slitter knives in there turning at a high rate of speed
cutting the tape as it goes through the machine
and it winds up here and from them into our packaging unit
we’re now at our packaging unit, this is where we’re going to make a nice pretty package for you to see in the store
the roll of tape comes on out packaging unit
sleeve goes on top goes into the oven and you end up with a nice retail package
we’re now in the final stage
of the process putting the box on the pallet
the way we add value is that we put in a lot of automated systems
so the big roll of tape will get cut into small ones
Packaged, put into boxes
put on the pallet
without anybody touching it
now it’s ready for your store
from everyday repairs
to creating crafts and outlets the possibilities are endless
with ducting