Paperboard mill benefits from using DC drives
An installation of DC drives from ABB is providing correct tension at BPB Paperboard in Purfleet, helping avoid downtime costs of potentially GBP 10,000 per hour.
Maintaining correct tension demands high accuracy and constant torque at high speeds. The DC drives keep the finished paperboard correctly tensioned while the products are wound onto reels during the final stages of manufacture. ABB’s DCS 600 drives operate with an accuracy of +/-0.01%, giving reliable winding whilst minimising the risk of breakage.
Drive reliability is important because a break in the paperboard can result in high downtime costs. The winder at Purfleet was upgraded as part of a modernisation programme to maintain efficiency at the mill.
Based on BPB Paperboard’s performance criteria, ABB supplied three DCS 600 Multidrive converters, load cells and associated control equipment. Other key components in the control system were upgraded, although the existing motors and control devices were retained.
Doug McConnachie, BPB Paperboard’s Project Manager notes:
“ABB’s DCS 600 Multidrive provided us with the best solution to integrate with the existing DC motors. The drives are highly efficient allowing us to get on with our job of producing high quality paper board”.
As part of the project, BPB initially built a new control room on the winder floor. ABB then fitted and integrated the DC drives with the mill’s original equipment. The drives are located on a separate floor away from the main plant. Once manufactured, the paperboard is cut to meet the correct specifications for an order and then packed as rolls for distribution.
As part of BPB Paperboard’s environmental commitment the Purfleet mill makes
paper products from recycled materials. The Purfleet mill makes a wide range of paperboard products for use in different industries, primarily liners for the production of gypsum board (plasterboard) in the UK and across Europe.