Field Trip; 6; Making Paper

Think again. And you don't know what it would take for so many of the things we use every day are made of paper paper carries the messages we send when we communicate with one another. The stationary envelope stamped and even the boxes they are packaged

in are made of paper. Paper is a very good wrapping material. Many of the items in the supermarket or drugstore are packaged in it. This is greater than papers at Mill at Millinocket. It is one of two paper mills in this area owned by the same company. The two mills have a capacity to produce over eight hundred fifty thousand tons of paper each year. This paper is used in printing catalogs telephone directories business forms magazines and newspapers to produce this much paper. The two mills run 24 hours a day seven days a week and use huge amounts of wood water and energy. It takes many people to make paper. Over 4000 are employed by Great Northern paper in fact the basic ingredient in paper

is wood. Wood comes from the forest pulp wood and tree lengths and 4 foot lengths is transported to the mill by rail and truck from company woodlands as well as from lands owned by individual tree farmers in Maine. None larger cut into four foot bets on the slasher and the stored outside the mill are placed into production immediately. This huge pile of three thousand cords of wood would disappear in about three days if it were not replenished fresh which makes the highest quality paper. This what is transported by sluices and conveyors to the wood room in the wood room the logs are placed in revolving drums to remove the bark as the drum rotates.

Most of the bark is rubbed off the logs. If the logs are not completely rid of their bark they are sent back to be processed again in the debarking drum. After the debunking process the logs go to the grinder room to be made into groundwood pulp or travel by conveyor to the chipper where they are reduced to three quarter inch chips in the grinder room the four foot beds of pipe would go into grinders that hydraulically pressed them against a large grindstone. The tremendous pressure reduces the wood to fibers. These fibers now called the ground wood. Or a mechanical pot of ice cream to take out impurities toothpicks and sawdust sized pieces of wood are too big for paper making and are removed here and reground the mechanical parts there's nothing in them stored for future use. Mechanical pipe is used in making newspaper catalogs. Computer paper paperback books

and some colored papers as well as many kind of school papers that are not bright white. The grinding process turns nearly all the wood into paper making fibers. This helps to make the manufacture of paper less expensive. My disadvantage of this process is that the pipe is weak and tears easily and the color is not bright white. Another way would arrives at the mail is in chip form supplied by Chip nails some nails and other commercial concerns. The chips are stored in large silos until they are needed. Another process for making wood pulp takes place in the sulfite mill. First chemical sulphur is burned the gases from the burning sand for I mixed with other chemicals to make an acid solution called the bi South cooking liquor. This acid solution is used to cook wood chips

under pressure in large containers called digesters the digester is much like your mother's pressure cooker. It uses heat and pressure to cook the wood chips much the same way the pressure cooker in the kitchen cooks food sulphite pulp results and is rushed to remove impurities including any remaining acid solution. Small particles of wood that do not make good paper are removed by screens and the pulp is thick and in this form it will use less energy when it is pumped to the paper machines. The sulphite pulp now looks like this and is stored in large tanks. The paper machine department where the paper is actually made occupies three huge rooms which contain 10 paper machines each machine is approximately 260 feet long runs at a speed of 18

miles an hour and can make a continuous sheet of paper. The width of a right lane highway. The sounds I pop is mixed in these machines with the groundwood pulp to increase the strength of the final product. Other materials such as coloring dyes are added at this time. The two part mixtures are blended together in exact proportions. The mixture is seen one final time and then pumped to the head box of the paper machine. Each hundred pounds of this pulp and water mixture now called stock is made up of one half pound of lead fibers and ninety nine and a half pounds of water. The stock mixture is forced out of the head box onto an endless mesh belt much like finally wears in the window screen called The Wire. As soon as the stock flows under the moving wire water begins to drain through the mesh. The wire moves over suction boxes that draw more water out of the pot as the paper is

formed. The paper is 20 percent dry at this point. The sheet of paper is then transferred to endless felts that carry it through a series of presses where more water is squeezed out and the paper made 40 percent. Next the paper goes to the dryers where the remaining water is removed. It costs ten times as much to remove a pound of water in the dryers as a dad is to remove a pound of water in the process. The dried paper next to the calendar stacks pressed down hard on thick places in the paper to make the sheets move. The finished paper is wound into a large roll the roll now weighing several tons is transferred to the winder where the paper is trimmed slit and rewound into smaller rolls that can be used on printing presses.

It takes about 25 minutes to complete each roll of paper. This paper mill makes a lightweight high gloss paper used for many of the magazines you buy at the drugstore and the supermarket. The paper used for the high quality color printing of magazines is coated on both sides with a thin layer of clay and starch which will allow the paper to print better. The clay and starch coating gives a dull finish to the paper. So it now goes to a machine called the super calendar which buffs the surface to make it a shiny. The engineers and paper makers are always trying to improve the performance of paper machines to reduce the cost of paper. One way to do this is to make new paper machines larger wider and faster. This paper machine is approximately three hundred twenty feet long and makes a

continuous sheet of paper the width of a two lane highway. This machine runs at a speed of about 30 miles an hour. Sometimes computers are used to more accurately control the operation of the paper machine. Special adjustments or corrections are made in the control room where the production of the paper is watched very carefully. The rows of paper are carefully inspected as they are made to be sure that the finished paper meets the high standards set by the mill and that it will meet the customer's expectations. These inspections are not the only ones made on the paper though. The company operates this quality control laboratory here technicians examine the pitiful quality at all stages and. And the fact that they checked the paper for strength how it tears how bright it is and its texture how it feels. Tests are made to see how different types of printing will work on the paper.

If there is a problem at one of the steps in the new factoring process it can be made right to keep the quality of the paper high back in the two finishing rooms the rows of paper are weighed and wrapped for shipment. This mill even manufactures its own wrapping paper on the wrapper machine wrapping is controlled by computers the process the wrap rolls all the way to the printing of the shipping label. The residue then taken by specialist trucks to the train sheds or truck loading docks for shipment to customers. Maine's 18 pipe mills and 21 paper mills make our state the second largest paper producing state in the nation second only to Wisconsin. The paper making industry is also the largest employer in our state providing over

20000 jobs and an annual payroll of over 400 million dollars. Paper makers on the average the best paid people in the industry because of the economic importance and its requirements for large amounts of natural resources wood and water and energy. You might think that the paper industry could do just about what it wanted to when it comes to our environment but it doesn't under federal and state guidelines and with their own money and expertise. The paper making industry has been a leader in the campaign to clean up the state's waterways. At the Miller we've been visiting the waste from the plant is removed through a water treatment system before it is returned to the Allied river near the plant. The quality of the treated water is well within the state of Maine waste water quality standards which are among the highest standards in the nation. The mill also reclaims much of the chemicals it uses in making the sulphite pulp and uses them

again scrap paper is another byproduct of the scrap paper is reintroduced into the paper making process during the pulp phase to make more paper. Even the discarded bark from the debarking process is burned to make steam which runs some of the paper making machinery waste treatment programs are very expensive and some take many years to complete the people of the paper industry are producing a product making can be proud of and the companies they work for are at the same time working to protect the environment and conserve energy. And with that number.