Asian paper producer Sun Paper recently successfully started up PM 2 at its site in Beihai in Southeast China. The new line in visionary industrial design now produces high-quality white folding boxboard with a basis weight of 170 to 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. 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."
Li Lu, Chairman of Sun Holding Group

"We are very pleased that the paper machine started up smoothly thanks to the joint efforts of Voith and Sun Paper. The line produces the best board quality currently available on the market."
Ying Guangdong, Vice General Manager and Chief Engineer of Sun Paper

Start-up in record time

There was 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. 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."
Dr. Michael Trefz, President Projects at Voith 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 highperformance 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 expertise 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.

About Sun Paper

Founded in 1982, Shandong Sun Holdings Group (sunpapergroup.com) is a global advanced integrated multinational paper group, a leader in the Chinese paper industry, ranked 306th among China's 500 largest companies and among the world's 30 largest paper manufacturers.

About the Voith Group

The Voith Group (voith.com) is a global technology company. With its broad portfolio of systems, products, services and digital applications, Voith sets standards in the markets of energy, paper, raw materials and transport & automotive. Founded in 1867, the company today has around 20,000 employees, sales of € 4.3 billion and locations in over 60 countries worldwide and is thus one of the larger family-owned companies in Europe.


About Voith Paper

The Group Division Voith Paper is part of the Voith Group. As the full-line supplier to the paper industry, it provides the largest range of technologies, services, and products on the market, and offers paper manufacturers holistic solutions from a single source. The company's continuous stream of innovations facilitates resource-conserving production and supports customers in significantly reducing their carbon footprint. With its comprehensive automation products and leading digitization solutions from the Papermaking 4.0 portfolio, Voith offers its customers state-of-the-art, digital technologies to increase the availability and efficiency of their systems in all areas of the production process.