Valmet will supply a new off-machine coating machine to Oji Papéis Especiais (OPE) in Piracicaba, Brazil. With the new off-machine coater PC4, OPE is seeking to increase thermal paper production capacity and strengthen its competitiveness globally, focusing on the Brazilian, South American and North American markets. The PC4 will increase OPE’s thermal paper production capacity by 80 percent. The start-up of the new off-machine coater is scheduled for November 2021.
The order is included in Valmet’s orders received of the second quarter 2020. The value of the order will not be disclosed. The value of an order of this type is typically around EUR 25-35 million.
“OPE chose Valmet as a partner for this PC4 project because Valmet has the most modern thermal coating application technology available in the market. Valmet’s curtain coating head is a coating application system with two simultaneous coating slides without contacting the paper and an optimum coating profile, and the low-energy consuming air dryers are highly efficient. The PC4 coater will also have the latest technology for distributed control system (DCS), the Valmet DNA automation system, as well as Valmet’s measurement and quality control systems (QCS). This new PC4 coater machine will position OPE among the world’s largest and most modern thermal paper mills,” says Giovani Varella, Industrial Director, Oji Papéis Especiais.
“The cooperation with OPE has been excellent, and our relationship was already on a very good level due to earlier automation projects. We worked actively together during the sales project to develop the most suitable concept for OPE’s targets. It is always essential for us to serve the customer as fast and well as possible during the challenging purchasing process. The performance of the key technologies was proven with successful pilot trials and references,” says Timo Saresvuo, Senior Sales Manager, Valmet.
Valmet’s delivery for the off-machine coater will include a new OptiCoat Layer curtain coating station, which gives a very good profiling and coverage even with thin layers, thus the amount of expensive thermal coating color can be kept low. The delivery includes also a re-reeler, an OptiCalender Soft calender, an OptiReel Center reel and OptiDry Coat coating air dryers. The air-drying capacity and their temperatures have been carefully calculated and optimized for high quality thermal paper. The delivery will also include a supply system for the curtain coater unit.
The start-up and the further optimization of the new board machine will be supported remotely from Valmet Performance Center utilizing the latest Industrial Internet solutions. Data-based and proactive remote support is a fast and efficient way to ensure that the optimal thermal paper quality is reached, and the machine is meeting the planned start-up curve. The automation delivery will include Valmet DNA automation system with machine controls and condition monitoring. It also will include Valmet IQ quality management system with a full-scale quality control, moisturizing profiler, and machine vision systems consisting of web monitoring (WMS) and web inspection systems (WIS).
The 4,200 mm wide (reel) off-machine coater will produce thermal grades in the basis weight range of 44-55 g/m2. The design speed is 1,200 m/min.
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