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CHEMCON-2014

IICHE
Date: 27 - 30 December 2014

ASSESSMENT OF QUALITY CONTROL PARAMETERS IN PULP AND PAPER


INDUSTRY
V. Chandrakanth*1, M. Sreeharsha1, Vedprakash1, R. B. Adusumalli2
1

Department of Computer Science, BITS-Pilani, Pilani -333031, India


venisettychandrakanth@gmail.com

Department of Chemical Engineering, BITS-Pilani Hyderabad Campus, Hyderabad - 500078, India


ramesh.babu@hyderabad.bits-pilani.ac.in
(Research Program: Chemical Technology)

Introduction
Pulp is manufactured from wood by using cooking and
bleaching processes in which lignin is removed from
wood cells as shown in Fig.1. Initially wood is cut into
chips of medium size and subjected to cooking at around
165OC for 4 hours with white liquor (NaOH, Na2CO3 and
Na2S) and the solution so formed is called pulp solution.
The filtered pulp is sent for bleaching where it is treated
with many bleaching agents. Based on the variety of
paper to be manufactured, bleached pulp is mixed with
various chemicals like alkyl-ketene-dimer, starch, optical
brightening agents and talcum to improve the properties
of the paper. During paper making, pulp slurry is
subjected to flow in horizontal direction (machine
direction MD) in which pulp forms as web of paper and
excess water is removed in different stages including
vacuum drying and steam drying. To avoid the wrinkles
and to increase the smoothness, paper sheets are subjected
to calendaring before packing.
Since it is difficult to test the single pulp fibres, testing of
final paper properties such as brightness, burst-factor,
tensile strength, etc., are generally practiced in quality
control (QC) laboratory using paper sheets, where these
parameters are tested by using machines, but the values
are entered manually in log book. In this procedure, it
becomes difficult to assess the data, for example GSM
(Gram per square meter) influence on Cobb value for a
period of one year. Since normal tools such as MS excel
will not allow entering data normally with consistency
and also for easy assessment, new tool has been
developed for assessing the QC data in any
manufacturing industry. HTML, PHP, and CSS are used
*Presenting author: V.

Chandrakanth
1

for the front-end. PHP and SQL are used for the backend. These portals make the user to use all these at a time
in an easier and secured way.
Distributor assesses the quality of paper by looking at the
values of the parameters obtained in QC lab. In paper
industry physical properties like GSM, tear factor, burst
factor, breaking length and optical properties like opacity,
brightness etc., are generally measured. In this paper, we
are going to demonstrate the tool, in which data can be
entered easily and multiple graphs can be generated so
that the technical experts in the paper mill could easily
understand the errors in the paper making. Accordingly
following decisions can be taken quickly:

Wood Chips

Paper

Unbleached Pulp

Bleached Pulp

Figure 1 Process of paper making using lignocellulosic


biomass such as wood chips.

CHEMCON-2014
IICHE
Date: 27 30 December 2014

Amount of chemicals to be added to maintain a GSM


Time of calendaring process
RPM of the steam rollers used for drying of the sheet
Refining time (fibrillation of pulp fibers)
Such decisions are made generally by referring to the
previous values of these properties (sometimes, average
of many such values are taken) for a specific GSM. If
graphs are plotted so as to indicate the average value of
that property for a particular GSM, we can easily adjust
the value of the property whenever we want to maintain a
particular GSM. Instead of looking at raw data for a
proper value to maintain for a property, if graphs are
generated indicating the values, it will be easier to make
quick decisions. Automated portals provide a good
interface for the user to enter data to be graphed easily,
thus portals act as a good tool in QC Laboratory.

manually which becomes difficult for the management


when assessment of parameters is required. Addition of
chemicals such as sizing agents in the stock preparation
need to be altered regularly to meet the customer
demands. In most of the paper mills, such decisions on
the alteration are made manually by referring to the
previously maintained values of such factors depending
on the GSM requirement. This involves a lot of human
brain to decide on the average values. The software tool
basically plots graphs of any properties against
corresponding GSM. It is designed such a way that it
calculates the average, maximum and minimum values of
a property from all the entries (up to one lakh) which
have that GSM. So such graphs make it easier to take
decisions on the values of properties to be maintained for
a particular GSM requirement. Moreover, the other
feature of the tool is to plot the average value of a
different property of paper maintained for a particular
GSM over a period of time. This tool can also be linked
to the automation of the entire process.

Results and Discussion

(Cobb value_Top; seconds)


(Tear factor_CD)

GSM 80

A portal has been developed successfully in which values


such as GSM, Cobb value (resistance to water
absorbance), Burst factor (resistance to perpendicular
force), Tensile strength (resistance to parallel force) etc.,
can be entered quickly. In this tool, analysis can be done
in two ways. The first feature is to generate graphs in
which all the properties that have been entered in the
entry page can be plotted against GSM as shown in the
Fig.2 (shown for 80 GSM). We can compare the variation
of the average values taken from some lakhs of entries of
different properties. The second one is to generate graphs
in which different GSMs can be plotted against one
property (not shown).

(Tear factor_MD)
(Burst factor)
(Folding endurance_MD; No. of Double folds)

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Advantages of tool
Data can be entered from any place and data consistency
can be maintained (data entered at one place is not easily
erasable). Redundancy can be avoided (data is not
repeated anywhere while entering). One of the major
technical advancement of this tool is that it can be
attached to the sensor networks of the paper machines, so
that according to the desired properties, the changing
factors mentioned earlier like RPM of the rollers, amount
of chemicals added in the pulp can be controlled by the
tool itself, thus automating the whole process and
reducing humane errors.

40

60

Figure 2 Sample graph indicating folding endurance in


machine direction(MD), burst factor, tear factor MD &
CD (cross direction), cobb value (top) against 80 GSM.

Acknowledgements: The authors express their


gratitude to Mr. K. Radhamohan and Mr. Murthy from
Sirpur Paper Mills LTD., Sirpur Khagaznagar, Telangana.

References
[1] R.B. Adusumalli, W.Mook, R.Passas, P.Schwaller,
J.Michler (2010). Journal of Material Science
45(10);2558-2563
[2] Karlsson H (2006). Fibre guideFibre analysis and
process applications in the pulp and paper industry.
AB Lorentzen & Wettre, Sweden.

Conclusions
This tool has been designed to analyze multiple data in a
manufacturing industry. In traditional companies
parameters are measured by high end machines, but saved
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