An Amazing Story behind the Manufacturing of Cardboard Boxes

2019-12-11 07:30:28

Invented by Robert Gair in 1871, the cardboard boxes have been humanity's most favorite objects to shift things around. Whether you have to deliver newly made products, change your apartment, or deliver important packages, cardboard boxes are always there. It is a very popular custom packaging article. The cardboard box looks very simple and neat but its manufacturing process is more complicated than you may think.

Making of a Corrugated Sheet

This is the most important phase of the manufacturing of large, medium and small corrugated boxes. The corrugated sheet is sandwiched between plain sheets and adds strength to the finished product. The cardboard boxes with the wavy structure are called the flutes. This structure provides enormous resistance to pressure when other boxes are laid either stored or while in transit. Recycled paper can be used in this process.

Once this sheet is made it passes through a rolling machine called the corrugator as a spray of hot steam is added to deepen the impressions of corrugation. Once the corrugated sheet passes through the corrugated at the other end it has to pass through another roller.

The other roller presses the down a sheet of paper with glue to the corrugated sheet. The sheets are joined well. The joined sheets pass through another machine that gives added pressure with tension ensuring that the two sheets stick together well via the added glue.

The Cutting Process of the Cardboard Sheets

Once the sheets are pasted together, they are passed through a sharp cutting saw and it cuts the boxes nine times depending on the customized sizes of the boxes to be made.

Separation of the Cardboard Sheets

The sheets are then separated mechanically into layers using aluminum tongs. In the next phase, the cut sheets for cardboard boxes are fed into a stacking machine that can take a feed of up to 25 to 80 boards. The quantities of boards that can be feed to the next machine are 8000 per hour.

The Trimming Machine Process

When the boards reach the trimming machine they are swiftly cut to have flaps and handles as they are designed.

The Cutting Machine Process

During the process when the corrugation is made and the sheets are well cut and glued, the trim is not enough to comply with the requirements of the customer. Therefore, the cardboards are passed through a cutting machine with rubber blades.

The Recycling Process

In the wake of environmental damage that packaging materials are causing to the environment, the cardboard boxes are very humble in the sense that they can be recycled many times reducing the environmental footprint.

The boxes described here can be processed at an astonishing rate of 90 boxes per minute. The paper that is cut off, from cardboard boxes is not wasted and can be recycled over and over again for as much as six more times.

The Bending Machine Process

While the box is processed by the corrugated machine the machine adds some bending lines. When the boxes reach the bending machine, the bending machine adds the bends to the lines already set by the corrugated machine.

Glue is applied to the parts that will be added to the cardboard packaging boxes. They are then passed to another machine that will fold the glued sections.

After that, the boxes are piled up into heaps and sent off to be shipped to other locations.

The Printing Process

To make customized printing and writing on the boxes, an ink kitchen is present in the manufacturing facilities. As much as 5000 colors are poured down systematically into containers.

A mixer machine then mixes up the colors with just the right color to print on the cardboard boxes. When that is done the cardboard packages are ready to carry anything imaginable and shipped to any destination.