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INDIA
Tyregrip Opens Second Retread Site
NSC Polymers Keen to Build Exports
Tyregrip continues to expand in the Western part of India. The Mumbai based retreader opened its second tyre retread site in Surat in April, almost after four years after it opened its first plant on the outskirts of Mumbai. Surat is a large commercial centre for the textile industry in the Western Indian state of Gujarat. The second plant caters for the surrounding 200km market, and has the capacity to retread 1,200 tyres per month by the precure process. Raj Sarvaiya, Director, Tyregrip said, “We need a year to
9 tyre chamber, 5 steam presses for truck tyres and three steam presses for light commercial vehicle tyres, plus three OTR moulds. It is also one of the first plants to install the Recamic process in Western India.
While tractor tyre of sizes 12/24, 13/24, 14/25, 17.5/25 & 18/25 are cured by the traditional hot process with the rest of the production is by the precure operation. The mother plant is also installed with equipment supplied by Glisten.
Tyregrip installed its Recamic
Noida based retread material and retreader NSC Polymers Pvt Ltd, is keen on expanding into the tread rubber export market. The company has two separate plants in Noida for retread production and one for manufacturing tread rubber. NSC has the capacity to produce about 80 tons each month but is manufacturing merely 30-40 tons depending on
demand.
With the slump in
the domestic market,
it is now keen to
expand in the export
market. “We have
been supplying to a
client in Poland and
are also in touch
with a few parties in
South Africa and
Jordan. If we get the
export order, the
production could be
scaled up to 80
tons,” said Sardar
Singh, Director, NSC
Polymers Pvt Ltd.
Commenting on the downturn in the domestic retread market, he said, “We have yet to recover from demonetisation when the government started implementing GST and that impacted our volumes in tread rubber as well as in retreading.”
NSC Polymers forayed into retreading almost 50 years ago with the traditional hot process, but later on switched to precure tread on its introduction into the Indian market. It has the distinction of being the first franchisee of Indag’s precure rubber in Delhi way back in 1983. The plant retreads about 1,000 TBRs
each month now.
The company forayed into tread rubber production in 1991 and emerged as a key supplier to various state- owned road transport corporations. “But in the last two years it discontinued supplies to those transport companies as government business is based on highly competitive pricing. With the
Sardar Singh, Director, NSC Polymers Pvt Ltd.
Raj Sarvaiya, Director, Tyregrip
streamline the operation and run the plant to the installed capacity. Installed with two 6 and 4 tyre autoclaves from Coimbatore based retread equipment supplier Glisten, Tyregrip has a contract arrangement with the Kerala based tread manufacturer to supply customised rubber under its own brand name.
Meanwhile, Tyregrip has plans to establish 2-3 more mid-capacity plants in the range of 1,000 to 1,500 tyres each month. “We are working on the plan, and we hope to have more plants in the region in the next 2-3 years,” Sarvaiya said.
The flagship plant at Mumbai caters for the local market through to Kolhapu 375km away. It commenced production in early 2014, the 6,000 tyres per month capacity plant operates slightly above half of its installed capacity, producing about 3,500 tyres on an average each month.
The multi-faceted plant operates the precure process and the traditional hot process, with one
system in 2015 and is the sole authorised franchisee of the process in Mumbai. On the number of tyres cured by the Recamic system, Sarvaiya informs, “We maintain on an average about 150 tyrse per month by the Recamic system.”
Commenting on the evolving positive retread scenario in India, he said, “The retread industry is growing in the countr y, as the overloading of vehicles has been checked with heavy penalties, Additionally, the road infrastructure is improving, opening up swift movement of fleets between states, bringing more tyres for the sector.” Moreover, long haul trucks with 12, 14, 18 tyre double-axle, tri- axle vehicles are now being introduced into the Indian market, bringing more tyre volumes for the new tyre as well as the retread tyre sector.
downturn in the sector and long credit terms we were forced to stop supplies to government business. We now focus on private operators,” Singh said. It markets its tread rubber under the Omdeep brand in the domestic market.
Currently, its retreading unit consumes about 10 tons tread rubber each month and the remaining 20-30 tons it supplies to retreaders in the cities of Srinagar, Mumbai, Rajkot, Ahmedabad, Pune etc.
The company also produces tread rubber for OTR and supplies to a few retreaders in the mining belt in the State of Jharkhand.
70 Retreading Business
JM Tyre Marc Shifting to Bigger Site
Coimbatore based tyre repair and service equipment supplier JM Tyre Marc is relocating to a new site three times larger than its present plant. Having operated from the present location since the 1980s, the company is expanding in line with the increasing requirements of the Indian tyre market. “Currently, we are operating from 5,000 sq ft plant, while our new site will spread over 15,000 sq ft area,” said Joseph Raj, CEO, JM Tyre Marc at Tyrexpo India 2018.
The plant is under final stages of construction and JM is expected to move to the new location in the next couple of months. “We will have truck alignment centre with oil and
battery service at the new site,” Raj informed.
With increasing popularity of the tubeless radial, JM is also focusing on catering for the evolving segment. “Our focus is on repairing tubeless radials and offering a range of new equipment for mounting, demounting, bead fitting, bead seater etc,” he said.
The tyre service sector is booming, JM is also expanding its distributor Sardar Singh, Director, NSC Polymers Pvt Ltd
network throughout the country. ‘We are also in the midst of appointing distributors in each state to provide market access to our increasing product range,’ he stated. The