Student Projects
Contact Information
University: University of Douala, Faculty of Industrial Engineering, Douala, Cameroon.
Team Members (with year of graduation): (1) Dominick BELONG NAUFI, (2) Eugene Armand MITAMBO, (3) Landry DJOPKOP KOUANANG
Faculty Advisers: Dr NGUEFFA HAPPI
Email Address: nguefa@yahoo.fr
Submission Language : English
Project Information
Title: Paper Recycling
Design Architecture
Once the paper waste generated, they are packed into balls and stored in a place prepared for this purpose pending treatment.
The first step in this process is the provision of these balls on the reception table. In fact, will be recycled through the production chain one type of paper at a time.
Following the reception table is a treadmill responsible for transporting from one point to another (the receiving table to the pre-cooking pot) balls of paper.
Once the balls introduced into the paper pre-cooking pot, it is heated to a certain temperature depending on the type of finished product to be obtained.
Then, the mixture which comes out is introduced into a pulper whose main role is to provide a homogenous moldable pulp paper.
The pulp obtained is charged with impurities (plastics, inks, metal layers, etc.) so it should be purified. This is made possible by means of a scrubber.
Cleaners
Pulp, rid of these impurities is once again treated with cleaners.
Phases of pressing and drying are required to obtain a formable pulp paper for processing into finished product (office paper, cardboard, or toilet paper).
This conversion step with coils to be loaded, in the case of the processing of paper pulp cardboard paper, office paper and toilet paper, to receive the sheets of paper prior to their packaging. In the case of the production of products such as egg cell, will be used as molds final processing equipment.
A glimpse of the recyling line.
Functional Description
Almost all of our system must be controlled through National Instruments LabVIEW and all modules that accompany it.
Speaking of pre-cooking pot, when the substrate is inside, we create a rise in temperature so that our substrate reaches a certain desired temperature. We proceed with an acquisition of the temperature through the MyTemp for NImyDAQ tool connected to itself, and the sensors are immersed in our pre-cooking pot. This is last-heating mechanism and we manage our Virtual Instrument (see Appendix). The user interface that we thought can easily control it to the extent that the person using it has real-time information on the temperature of the pot and is automatically notified when the desired temperature is reached. The importance of this step is undeniable, as it is this that allows us to differentiate the different products obtained at the end of recycling according to whether one wants to have paper or cardboard.
All other steps in the process involve engines: These will preferably NI Motion Controllers in the context they are controlled by the NI LabVIEW Soft Motion Module. For each part, a LabVIEW code is associated with this module, but the fact that it is not exploited for any simulation requires that we do not present it in the context of this document. It should be noted that all components in a futuristic measure should work in harmony and therefore a single code will be loaded into all programmable devices that are at our disposal.
We wish to emphasize that each of the elements that we have mentioned in this document has been produced by our team and no information, illustration, photograph or foreign are added.
Results and Discussion
The biggest challenge we have faced in this competition was the time. Indeed, for reasons unknown, the material that was most helpful arrived three weeks before the end of the competition, forcing us to work under pressure. We had to show organization and professionalism to get the result shown.
On the other hand, we were ready to make a complete project for this competition, but we faced the problem of lack of equipment that it is. We already had everything prepared in advance and we were waiting for the sophisticated National Instruments hardware to complete the project by the practical phase. Given the context, we decided to make the part for which we had the equipment stating that it is a physics simulation that we made, and the other part of the process by hand.
The advantage of using this material is that data acquisition in real time is very simple and therefore work becomes easier. This device can also be easily integrated into the industrial system we want to achieve in the future.
Our industrial system will allow us in the future to produce reams of format and other paper products such as paper bags, packing cartons, egg cells, which limit, hopefully, the import paper in our country. Especially, this system uses as raw material waste paper mills that are freely allowing us to have a substantial profit.
In addition, the social impact of this project is significant in the sense that during the initial phase of our activities is planned a campaign to raise public awareness about the proper management of waste paper. We thus aim to instill the concept of recycling, which, when applied, will protect our environment for materials such as paper, plastic, metals and glass.
Conclusion
The benefits of conducting large-scale paper recycling project are well documented so well that other African countries (Kenya, Uganda, Morocco) have already adopted this concept and produce products which are derivatives.
The importance of the study followed by the experiences we have had to make is the fact that we combine the latest technology (through LabVIEW, NImyDAQ, NI MOTION and NI MyTemp and others), and a method that respects environment. We have shown that in the context of sustainable development, it is possible to use these methods together and achieve a beneficial outcome to the communities concerned.
Of course, there are still additional studies and analyzes to be done to improve the project and we hope that this is the case once the competent authorities having addressed the issue.
