From Paper-mill to PressroomWheelwright, William Bond
Philosophy
From Paper-mill to Pressroom
Wheelwright, William Bond
Papermaking
Wood-pulps are of two classes, mechanical and chemical. In the lay mind
there often appears to be some confusion between the two, leading to an
unreasonable prejudice against papers made from either class. The fact
is so generally known that news-print, one of the cheapest grades of
paper, is made from wood, that the partially informed person is prone
to think that all wood papers are of low quality, whereas paper of
permanence and excellent quality may be made from the high grades of
wood cellulose chemically prepared.
GROUND WOOD.--The mechanical, or ground wood, as its name implies, is
made by grinding logs from which the bark has been removed. The logs
are shipped, or floated from the lumber camps to the mills, where
they are cut to convenient length and the bark is removed. Next they
are taken to the grinders. One type of grinder consists of a vertical
grindstone encased in an iron jacket. There are three pockets over
its circumference into which the logs are placed. They are held by
hydraulic pressure against the revolving stone, over which flows a
stream of water, and are rapidly reduced to fibers. These fibers are
carried by the flowing water into a chamber below the grinders, passing
through a screen which catches the coarser bits, the fibers of suitable
size thus being separated from the rest. This pulp is still not
sufficiently fine or uniform, so it is pumped into screens and forced
through the finely perforated plates. The fibers are carried through
with a large quantity of water, and are formed into thick sheets by
means of a so-called “wet machine.”
WET MACHINE.--The wet machine consists of a vat, in which a partially
submerged hollow drum rotates. The surface is covered by a wire cloth,
and the hollow axle of the drum acts as a drain for the fiber-laden
water, which, in passing through the drum, deposits a film of fibers
upon the revolving surface. This soft pulp film, continuously forming,
is removed from the top of the drum by an endless felt running tangent
to it, and held in close contact with it by a couch roll, the pressure
of which causes the web of pulp to adhere to the felt.
The felt passes between two squeeze rolls, and the pulp adhering to
the upper roll is wound up until a certain number of layers have
accumulated, when it is cut across by a knife and removed as a thick
sheet.
[Illustration: WOOD GRINDER]
The sheets, folded to a convenient size, separated by alternate pieces
of sacking, are put in a hydraulic press and squeezed to remove the
water. The pulp is taken from the press about fifty per cent moist;
the sheets are separated from the sacking and are now ready for use
or for shipment. It is also quite customary to ship the pulp without
having pressed it. In this case it contains about 70% water, due
allowance for which is made in billing.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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