Full capacity
When Knitting Industry spoke to Lonati at the end of May this year, the company was working
flat out at full capacity and producing 33 machines per day on average, with lead times
running at 5-6 months. The company is currently attempting to increase its capacity
and its top socks and hosiery machine markets worldwide are currently Turkey, China, USA,
Pakistan, Japan and Russia.
The vast majority of Lonati machines now incorporate the company’s automatic toe-closing
technology, with open toe machines accounting for only around 20% of production, which
has dropped to around 12% in 2018.
With the demise of the women’s hosiery market in recent years, Lonati’s best-selling machines
is now the GOAL GK616F S-by-S, 3 ¾” diameter, 6 colour, single feed machine for
men’s socks.
Low energy initiative
With the cost of compressed air soaring, Lonati is also developing a new generation of
machines with reduced air consumption. The’green range’yields energy savings of up to
30%, according to the manufacturer.
The first machines to receive Lonati’s energy savings initiative were the DONNA LB10Y7 and
LB12Y7 women’s pantyhose machines with automatic toe closing. According to Mark Frost,
the machines are “less pneumatic and more electronic, giving lower energy
consumption – but also yielding productivity increases of 5-6%. We will now apply the new
energy savings features to other models.”
The first low energy machines have recently been sold into Japan, Italy and North America.
