Voith's order execution in record time

Successful start-up of Sun Paper's XcelLine PM 2 in Beihai

Asian paper producer Sun Paper recently successfully start-up PM 2 at its site in Beihai in Southeast China. The new line in visionary industrial design now produces a high-quality white folding boxboard with a basis weight of 170–350 gsm and a wire width of 8,900 mm. With a design speed of 1,400 m/min, the planned annual capacity is over 1 million tons of paper. Thanks to the very successful cooperation between Sun Paper and Voith, the entire project from initial contracting to start-up in December took only 18 months – a new world record for a high-speed line of this type. This is the third paper machine that Voith has started up for Sun Paper in the last 12 months. In total, Voith has already delivered 12 XcelLine paper machines to Sun Paper.

"Sun Paper and Voith are trustful partners," said Li Lu, chairman of Sun Holding Group. "From Laos PM 2's 1-hour and 46-minute start-up to today's Beihai PM 2, the fastest project execution at 18 months, we have created many world records together."

"We are very pleased that the paper machine started up smoothly thanks to the joint efforts of Voith and Sun Paper," said Ying Guangdong, vice general manager and chief engineer of Sun Paper. "The line produces the best board quality currently available on the market."

There were only seven and a half months between the start of installation and the successful machine start-up, even with the major challenges presented by Covid-19. To ensure the on-time arrival of all components, Voith stabilized all upstream global supply chains. Voith's excellent supply chain management and project management, as well as close coordination, high degree of flexibility and additional shifts made it possible to meet the ambitious schedule.

"The high-speed plant uses the latest technologies," said Dr Michael Trefz, president of projects at Voith Paper. "In combination with the visionary industrial design, the plant sets the highest standards in terms of efficiency, safety and sustainability. The start-up is another milestone in the successful and long-standing partnership between Voith and Sun Paper."

As a full-line supplier, Voith supplied the entire XcelLine paper machine in the new industrial design. The tailor-made concept focuses in particular on the efficiency and robustness of the individual components. For example, a DuoFormer ensures excellent formation and strength properties even at very high speeds. Automatic dewatering of the three shoe presses reduces thermal drying and thus saves significant energy costs. For an optimized paper surface, a SpeedSizer is used as well as four DynaCoaters, which apply the film evenly during sizing and coating. Furthermore, the CombiDuoRun dryer section with EvoDry steel dryer cylinder ensures maximum runnability and energy efficiency. In addition, two VariFlex high-performance winders ensure smooth production. Due to the visionary Voith industrial design of the entire line, optimized accessibility for maintenance work and improved occupational safety are also achieved.

Sun Paper also benefits from Voith's leading expertize in digitalization and automation for additional efficiency gains and cost reductions. The intelligent quality control system QCS as well as the solutions DCS and MCS enable complete control over the entire production line. In addition, Sun Paper relies on solutions from the Papermaking 4.0 portfolio with OnCare.Health. Thanks to a wide range of interfaces, the intelligent maintenance tool detects the smallest faults at an early stage and automatically assigns them to the affected points.

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