I was pleased to recently attend my first International Munich Paper Symposium from March 14-16. IMPS was a more uniquely German conference than others I have attended, with fully 69% of participants coming from Germany, Switzerland and Austria. Twenty-one other countries were represented, including from the Middle East, Scandinavia, India and Pakistan. It was disappointing to have only a scant appearance from anywhere in North or South America.
The theme of the Symposium was “Progress in Board and Paper Technology”. To that end a number of start-up experiences and technology upgrades (shoe presses and formers) were presented.
From my more narrow perspective I found greater interest in the cost savings achieved with Ecopump™ variable speed vacuum pumps www.fipptec.com, the removal of problematic ions with reverse osmosis membranes www.kurita.de/en, and Voith’s CTC process for turning paper mill sludge into usable minerals.
There were also a limited number of select exhibits at the symposium. The BladeCheck™ measurement device caught my eye as a good new tool for monitoring basic details like uniform doctor blade pressure to avoid moisture profile problems and improve paper quality.
FIELD TRIP
The most informative and insightful event from my trip was the outstanding visit to Océ Printing. Océ is the European and North American market leader in continuous web digital printing. I had no idea of the technology and capability of these presses.
What Océ uniquely does is ‘design and control’ technology. Imagine the technology to code every volumetrically variable drop for each piezoelectric nozzle (40 x ~2700) every time it pulses, or not , and the parameters that have to be calculated to exactly reproduce an image that can change with each impression, front and back; then, maintain security to keep track of exactly which images are printed and where the printer must restart if there is a break or pause in the process.
These presses are printing up to 200 mpm, 3.3 meters per second, which equates to over 3000 A4 or 8½”x 11” impressions per minute! The physical limit to speed will come at about 800 mpm. But before that speed is reached the physics of the process (speed of the ink droplet, air entrained with paper entering the system, the ability to remove water from the ink) will begin to interfere at around 500 mpm.
Ironically, the thing that truly has the printer manufacturers nervous is the ability for paper to keep up with the performance demands. The current biggest worry is water transport from the ink into the paper so the image can be dried at high production speeds.
The other fascinating tidbit of information I learned is that many books ordered on-line do not exist at the time they are ordered. Rather, when a printed book order is received, it is only then that the book is printed.
Further, and perhaps hopefully for the paper and publishing industries, a print book can often be delivered at lower cost than an e-book! Apparently, there are so many revenue streams being drawn from the production and delivery of e-books that it is cheaper to reproduce the book in hard copy form.
So there is a challenge and opportunity for the graphic papers business.