Simultaneous Twin-Blade Coating: The Success of the First Commercial Application, 1999 Coating Conference Proceedings

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Susanne Öhman, Åke Olsson & Lennart Westman, Stora Enso Grycksbo Mill
Louise Törnefalk & Tore Eriksson, BTG

This paper discusses the world’s first successful commercial installation of a blade coater that simultaneously and uniformly coats both sides of a paper web. The installation is at the Stora Enso Grycksbo mill in Sweden, where coated wood-free fine paper is produced. The twin blade coaters replaced a blade/film and a film/film coater, respectively.

The primary objectives of the mill were to improve the product quality by upgrading the two smaller paper machines, working within feasible investment parameters. The low installation cost of this method to blade coat both sides of the paper simultaneously was a determining factor in the project going forward. The cost of two trailing blade stations with the required drying sections and lengthening of the paper machine was prohibitive.

The paper quality achieved is comparable to traditional blade coated papers and in some aspects even better. New soft-tip blades provide better fiber coverage than do normal blade coaters. The runnability is good, but as anticipated before the rebuild, there has been a slightly increase in the break figure.