Succesful synergies

SL4 FF No. 1, the world’s first V-Perfect welding machine!

Interview with Lazzaro Simoncini owner of INFISTIL 

“It is an honour and a great satisfaction to be able to say that the world’s first welding machine, the SL4 FF No. 1, was purchased by us at Infistil in 2013.

At the time, a GRAF agent suggested the new welding machine to us, believing that we were the right company with the right technical background to use it while it was still a prototype in the final stages.

Since November 2012 we participated in the final stages of fine-tuning the prototype, on which the first welds were made. The windows made at that time are still installed and working at some of our customers! This is a source of pride for us.

The reason why we have invested in a brand new technology, never tried by anyone else, is that our company has always been a pioneer in the search for new technologies for growth in the window industry, innovations to develop new products, open up new markets and improve final quality.

I do not hide our concern, at the time, in making such a leap, because when one chooses to use a new, revolutionary, untried technology, one easily runs the risk of running into errors of judgement, which in this case could have compromised the durability of the product, our windows, and consequently undermined the good name and success of our company.

Infistil was born in 1967, in the 1980s we were among the first in Italy to process PVC as extruders, so we are quite well known in the Italian market: when the news came out that we were the first in the world to use GRAF’s unprecedented seamless technology, competitors joined in a chorus of scepticism about our choice. I also well remember the attempts to dissuade potential customers by creating and spreading doubts about the strength of the welds made with the new technology.

However, it soon became clear to everyone that we were able to prove exactly the opposite: the windows were more than solid and the aesthetics of the product were unrivalled. Simply unattainable.

Until then, PVC was reserved for the role of ‘poor brother’, used mainly for economic convenience due to its poor aesthetic qualities. V-Perfect technology, along with other innovations, has literally revolutionised the world of PVC by making it a product with an attractive design, making it rightfully part of a market that was previously mainly in favour of wood and aluminium.

Unfortunately, today we no longer have the ‘mythical’ FF No.1, we had to part with it due to the evolution of our business, which prompted us to replace it recently with an FF EVO, the next model, also from GRAF Synergy. No.1 was sold to another company that continues to use it at full capacity, like us. With a quick calculation, I can say that to date that machine will have done at least 140/150,000 welding cycles!

After 11 years of V-Perfect welds, I can say that if at first I was convinced to jump into that brave choice, today the results have proved me right, and I am even more convinced of my idea.

And the story continues… part two will be online soon.

In the photo  Lazzaro Simoncini