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Recyclability/Sustainability informationYOUR QUESTION: I have received several phone calls lately on the recyclability and recycling of corrugated containers. Can you provide some bullet points of us to have good conversations with customers? ASK Ralph RESPONDS: It was good to talk with you yesterday. Here are some web sites to visit that should provide the "boilerplate" that you are looking for. There is more detail behind these general statements. Let us know what you need especially on the sustainability and forestry aspects of your question. Make sure you move around and investigate within each web site. http://www.afandpa.org/Content/NavigationMenu/Environment_and_Recycling/...
Combined Board Quality SpecificationsFile Combined Board Properties When you sit down with your sheet supplier(s) to begin the process of establishing combined board properties consider the following as guidelines for the properties listed below: Edge Crush Test: You need 20% more vertical compression coming in the front door to overcome the rigors of the normal converting processes so that you can be comfortable that the grade you stamp on the bottom of the box is actually what is provided. Flat Crush Test: Ask for 35 psi. Warp: No more than 1/8 inch per foot. Pin Adhesion: Seek 60 pounds per linear floor of glue line. Caliper: Inquire into the ranges for each board combination. Flexural Stiffness or Four Point Bending: This is a test which only a few labs can perform, but it is critical to the performance to the displays and graphics you produce.
What are other manufacturers doing in the area of testing?MEMBER: We are a full line medium sized corrugated box plant. Our combining equipment is not new nor has it been rebuilt from the inside out. However, we do have process testing procedures and that makes all the difference. We do random testing every week. We test combine board off the corrugator as well as after it's been converted. The quality assurance that we promise our customer is that they will receive a box that will meet and perform to their expectations. We serve a very particular pharmaceutical industry.
ECT32 and 200 TestMEMBER: We have a customer that says they are receiving a 200# test box from an other box maker, but our testing indicates that the board combination consists of 36# liners and 26# medium. How can this be valid? RALPH YOUNG: You raise a good question and one that has been asked for almost twenty years. Rule 41 and Item 222 require any box that carries a circular 200# test stamp to be comprised of 42# liners and 26# medium. You have described your customer as placing boxes in a refrigerated environment and that they sometime experience box failures. Where a box described as 32# ECT may have sometimes performed in the past, the customer is now demanding boxes with a 200# test construction. Every corrugated construction has weight, caliper, flat crush, pin adhesion, edge crush, Mullen, and flexural stiffness. These physical properties are common to all structures. So even a 200# test box may have low ECT and low box compression and still fail your customer shipping environment. There are many reasons for box failures. Very little has to do with the basis weights of the components. All that maybe needed is to change to a water resistance adhesive. The more you can tell me about temperatures, relative humidity, storage times, pallet design, pallet layers, box dimensions, content weights. I would be available to coordinate with your testing facility to engineer the best solutions for you and the end user.
Where can I find used crush testers?MEMBER: Can you direct me to used crush testers so that we can perform combined board tests, especially ECT?
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