Shellac

Shellac is a natural gum resin, a natures gift to the mankind and is used in over 100 industries and is only produced in India, Thailand and china and is exported to over 100 countries of the world. It is natural, non toxic & edible resin.

Hand Made Shellac :

Seedlac is converted into Shellac either by traditional hand made process or comparatively modern machine made process. Hand made shellac is produced by properly blending Seedlac into long narrow cloth bag and heating one end over charcoal fire and the other end is attached to a windless and is gradually twisted. The heat produced by the charcoal fire melts the lac which is forced out through the cloth by pressure. The molten lac is scraped out and drawn into sheets manually and left to dry. This process requires considerable manual skill and long experience.

Machine Made Shellac :

Machine Made Shellac is produced in two different ways-Heat process and Solvent process.

Heat Process

Separation of pure lac is achieved by melting seedlac by steam heat and squeezing the soft molten lac through filter by means of hydraulic presses. The molten lac is then stretched by means of rollers into long and continuous sheets which is broken into pieces to form the 3 machine-made shellac under heat process.

Solvent Process

The separation of insoluble impurities is achieved by dissolving the lac in a suitable solvent, usually industrial alcohol, the solution is then filtered through fine cloth and the alcohol is recovered by boiling the solution. The molten shellac is then stretched to the required thickness on a roller followed by stretching machines. The solvent process lends itself to manufacture of different type of shellac containing varying percentage of shellac wax. Dewaxed or partly dewaxed shellac may be manufactured by this process. The wax content may be as low as 0.2%.