De Jong Packaging improves quality and delivery capability with Valmet IQ Quality Control system

A key investment

In 2020 De Jong Packaging made the investment in a Valmet IQ Corrugator Quality Control System. Combining precise online moisture, temperature and warp measurements together with reliable closed-loop controls and moisturizers, Valmet IQ stabilizes raw material and process variations to optimize both process performance and sheet quality in the corrugator.  

"One of the challenges needing a solution was with the varying moisture levels of paper rolls fed to the machine, this affects everything from gluing to the final physical appearance of the sheets and afterwards to final products. The Valmet system now takes care of this automatically and provides us with continuous measurement of the flatness (warp) of the corrugated sheets. This improves further our capability to serve our customer on time and with promised quality," says Mattheus Piek, New Business Manager, De Jong Packaging. 

Mattheus Piek, New Business Manager, De Jong Packaging 

Consistently high quality

The board from the corrugator is now reliably consistent which makes the setup of tooling at the converting machines faster.  

"Short delivery times are one of our strengths and with 50 to 60 order changes per day, efficient converting operations are vital to maximize production"

"The shorter setup times help us to respond quickly to an immediate customer need, as sometimes happens in the fresh produce market, in addition to guaranteeing a better quality of product under all circumstances. The Valmet system gives real added value to the corrugator by ensuring that the board strength and appearance meet customer requirements," says Raymond Segers, Marketing Manager, De Jong Packaging.

Raymond Segers, Marketing Manager, De Jong Packaging

Additional insight

"Additional knowledge about the corrugator operation has been a big benefit, it gives us better information on specific product issues"

"The insight we now have with the Valmet system to our key performance indicators like moisture, temperature, and warp has improved 10-fold and with this understanding, we can make quality improvements. Settings to the machine can now be made much more easily to achieve a higher-level quality than was earlier possible. “It’s a two-step process, first to have a better understanding of the key performance indicators and then to make changes that result in a better product," adds Piek. 

The importance of training 

Operators have readily accepted the new system with the assistance of good training. The system has also improved cooperation between the corrugator and converting departments by supporting root cause problem analysis. 

"If we have a problem in converting, we can see where it is and quickly respond," says Piek.

"We concentrated early on as to how the system would help them and make their job easier. Initially, they were curious as to how it would work, but acknowledging that for a family company it was a big investment, they were very willing to work with the system," says Segers.

Good support 

Contact to Valmet has been very direct with technical, software and training support readily available. 

"It’s nice to have a partner that works closely with us, it gives us a lot of faith and trust that our needs are being met and that we can achieve our improvement targets in a direct manner," concludes Piek.   

Forerunner of corrugated board industry

Founded by owner Henk de Jong in 1996, De Jong Packaging in the Netherlands is today the biggest corrugated factory in Northwest Europe. They pride themselves on knowing what the customer expects of their corrugated packaging and deliver a full-service product, from design and manufacturing to delivery. Products cover trays for the fresh produce industry, boxes for the food- and non-food industry, e-commerce and boxes for the horticultural sector as well as many other corrugated items. The biggest part of the 2.5 million boxes made every day are custom made and this places great demands on all aspects of the production process, especially the corrugator where the layers of paper and flute are glued together.