Hydroentanglement and fibre orientation study on hemp bast fibre slurry.

摘要

Decreasing forest area and environmental concerns over common disposal practices used for agriculture fibres are forcing the forest product industry to look into other fibre resources in addition to wood. One of the promising non-wood fibre source available in Canada is Hemp. Long and strong hemp bast fibres have the potential to increase the strength of paper cost effectively. Hemp bast fibres along with their strength and length advantages also bring some process problems. Hemp bast fibres have inherent tendency to get hydroentangled which gives rise to flow properties different from wood fibre suspensions. Hydroentangled fibres are hard to distribute uniformly which cause plugging of headbox and non-uniform paper formation.; The objective of this work is to understand the effects of various process variables on hydroentanglement and orientation of hemp bast fibres. In this study, image analysis techniques are used to examine the dependence of hydroentanglement and fibre orientation on fibre length, consistency and hydrodynamic conditions.