Any Suggestions for Removing Starch
May 17, 2022
Carl asks:
As part of my internship, I’ve been tasked with investigating ways to remove starch build-up from our corrugator sections. We tend to get heavy build around the glue machines (of course), but also on many other components of the corrugator. Our crews can spend hours scraping and chiseling to remove build up. We try to stay on top of it, but since we are a high output operation it can quickly get ahead of us. In your experience have you come across any safe alternatives to remove buildup and how fast they may be?
You’re not alone. It seems like no matter how careful a corrugator operation is, it ends up with starch someplace we don’t want it. With the high speeds corrugators are running today, spray, sling and other types of transfer can quickly create unwanted buildup and even stalactites of starch.
There are chemical solutions available that will dissolve starch. Some are based on biodegradable enzymes and claim to be safe to crews and the environment. It’s said that these solutions/systems quickly dissolve dried starch, but how fast to go from buildup to clean machine will, of course, depend on how severe the buildup is. However, I believe it is safe to say that it will be quicker, probably much quicker and safer for the machine and crew than hammer and chisels.
What are other readers doing to keep their corrugators clean? Let us know.
— Ralph
