Straw, MDF, even card?

25 June 2010

This company, which gained a listing on the Shanghai stock exchange in 2001, has seven subsidiaries, involved in glass (its first and currently its biggest business venture), food processing, strawboard manufacture and now MDF.
Sichuan Guodong Construction also has two laminating lines from Dieffenbacher, a Vits impregnation line for overlay papers and two Homag lines for making laminate flooring, all at the strawboard factory, which is located approximately 10km from the MDF/HDF line, both of which are in Shuangliu town, not far from Cheng Du city.
Construction of the new fibreboard line on its 700mu (47ha) site began in March 2004 and the six-storey office building was completed in October. The site cost around RMB50m (US$6m) and a second fibreboard line is planned once the first is running well and has established its market.
At the time of WBPI’s visit in early April, the factory buildings were not complete, as the final equipment installation was not due to be finished until the end of the month. The company hoped to produce the first panels in May.
The main part of the fibreboard line was supplied by Dieffenbacher, from forming to the book saw; of course including the CPS continuous press, which has an effective length of 40.3m and a width of nine feet.
Mr Yunquan Xiong, general manager for the MDF/HDF division of Sichuan Guodong Construction, said this gives the mill a capacity of 300,000m3 on an 8mm board basis. “We will be producing both MDF and HDF and we also want to make a low density board for wall panelling – around 400-500kg/m3,said Mr Yunquan. “We are aiming for the domestic market and our production will represent around 10% of the consumption in Cheng Du as there are many, many furniture producers in this area.”
The company plans to set up its own raw material base and has plans for 100,000mu (around 6,670ha) of plantations and was in the process of purchasing land in April.
“In the meantime, we will use the existing raw material base in Cheng Du, which is pine and eucalyptus,said Mr Yunquan.
“The plan is to produce 3, 4 and 5mm raw fibreboard for the construction and decoration markets initially,said the general manager. “We already have the value adding facilities at our strawboard line, with spare capacity in the short-cycle lines.”
Mr Yunquan then added a surprising footnote: “We then intend to modify the line a little to enable us to produce cardboard. We have applied to the government for a patent to produce cardboard on this kind of line. There is no other line in the world producing cardboard using the dry process and Dieffenbacher has said that they believe it is possible.”
Many panel plants and other factories in China experience problems with the electrical power supply, particularly in the winter, but Mr Yunquan said that, with effect from March this year, the problems in the Cheng Du area had been resolved because more power stations had been built. However, the company does have an emergency diesel generator.
The MDF/HDF factory has an energy plant supplied by Vyncke of Belgium, which Mr Yunquan proudly stated was, at 65MW capacity, the biggest in China.
The mill was also destined to be self-sufficient in resin supply as it will have its own resin plant, supplied by a Chinese company.
“We will produce only E1 board and will also be able to produce E zero,said the general manager.
Preparation of the wood raw material employs chippers supplied by Andritz of Austria, which also supplied the chip washing, screening and woodyard equipment. The logs are debarked before chipping.
The refiner is from Pallmann of Germany and is a 62in unit – again the biggest in China, according to Mr Yunquan.
GreCon supplied the thickness detection between pre-press and press and Imal supplied the magnetic metal detector.
A Holzma sawing system will cut the panels to the standard 4ft x 8ft size, but the factory does not plan to offer a full cut-tosize service, although it will cut laminate flooring blanks on demand for the flooring line at the strawboard factory.
So Sichuan Guodong Construction has added another 300,000m3 or so to Chinese MDF capacity. This comes at a time when many commentators are questioning the need for the capacity which already exists. But Mr Yunquan is not concerned in the least. “We think that in the next 10 years, MDF capacity will expand very fast, based on information we have. People who say there is too much capacity are only looking at furniture and decoration, whereas we want to go for the construction market with products such as wallboard and we think, in these areas, MDF will continue to have a big and increasing market.
“In China, suppliers of thicknesses under 3mm have sufficient orders. For MDF we have a phenomenon, with imported production lines being used for thin board and locally made lines being used for thicker board,added Mr Yunquan. “In the beginning, imported and local lines produced the same material but, in recent years, there has been this split between thick and thin.”
In addition to its strawboard and this new fibreboard line, Sichuan Guodong also has a Bison particleboard line in Guangyuan, also in Sichuan province. This is a 50,000m3 a year single-opening line and, as the only line of its kind in south west China, Mr Yunquan says it has a good market.
The company is also considering buying a calender press line for the production of very thin MDF.
Then, maybe, there is cardboard...
“We are also negotiating with the government about increasing our particleboard capacity, because the government wants more particleboard,added Mr Yunquan. “Our assets will rise to RMB5bn in the next three years and our group president, Wang Chunming, has done a lot of work to achieve this goal.

New offices at Shuangliu factory
Andritz chipper under final construction in the chipper building, which awaited its roof
Dare Wood chairman Wang Chunming
Entry to the Dieffenbacher CPS continuous press which is 40.3m long and nine feet wide