Experimental evaluation of Z-directional fibre-fibre bond strength using microrobotics

There is a large interest in the measurement of the Z-directional bond strength in pulp and paper/board industry. Several methods have been developed to measure the Z-directional strength at a handsheet level; however, there is not any reported device capable of the Z-directional fibre-fibre bond strength measurement at a fibre level. This paper presents a novel method for the experimental evaluation of the Z-directional bond strength using microrobotics and a Polyvinylidene fluoride (PVDF) film microforce sensor. In bond strength experiments, different deformation rates are needed. Therefore, the effect of the deformation rate on the performance of the proposed sensor is studied and successful experiments on unrefined bleached softwood kraft pulp fibres are demonstrated.