CHAPTER-2
PAPER
Paper is the most commonly used and most important writing surface in the world. In forensic
document examination, paper is not just a background—it is evidence.
Before paper was invented, people wrote on stone, clay tablets, palm leaves, parchment, and papyrus.
Papyrus was made from the bark (stem) of the papyrus plant, mainly used in ancient Egypt. It is one of
the earliest writing materials known to humans. A fragment of papyrus dated around 3500 B.C. is
preserved in the Palace Museum, proving that writing materials existed thousands of years ago. Modern
paper was invented by Cai Lun (Ts’ai Lun) in 105 A.D. in China. He prepared paper from cellulose, using:
Old rags, Mulberry tree fibers.
Nature of Paper
Paper may be thin or thick, smooth or rough, hard or soft, strong or weak, white or colored, transparent
or opaque. With the hundreds of different kinds of paper available today, there is a paper suitable for
every process, any job and all purposes. The correct selection of paper and its suitability for use in the
printing processes are important because paper is the material used in printing which can be felt as well
as seen in the finished product. The selection of a paper may therefore enhance or lower the quality and
appearance of a job.
FIBROUS MATERIALS
Cellulose fibres can be regarded as the common building brick of the paper. It may be of a blade of grass
or in the trunk of the largest tree. In a few materials like cotton and linen, the cellulose exists in a purer
form. Although almost any plant material can be used for paper making the following requirements are
to be considered to enable to use commonly for paper making. The plant must be abundant and cheap,
even to the extent that it must be of no use for any other manufacture, i.e., waste product. The fiber itself
when isolated should be suitable for paper making. It should be long and strong and should develop
strength on heating. At the same time it should be capable of being bleached to a good colour without
undue loss of strength.
COMMON PAPER MAKING FIBRES
Cotton Fibres
The purest form of natural cellulose is the second hair of the cotton plant. When the boll (or seed pod) is
ripe it bursts open and the hair cottonseeds can be picked. The cotton used in textiles also comes back to
the paper-maker in the form of discarded rags. These are the main sources of cotton for papermaking.
Rags vary considerably in quality and prices are therefore carefully sorted. The badly soiled and worn
grades are especially suitable for making blotting paper. The best new white cuttings from the textile mills
are suitable for the highest grades of paper especially hand made. Such papers include high-grade writings,
currency and legal paper.
Linen:
It is obtained form the last tissues of the flax plant but as with cotton, the paper-maker receives only the
rejects or waste and discarded rags from mills. This material is best suited for thin strong papers like bank
notes and airmail paper.
Wood:
Wood fibres are largely used in paper making as raw material. Spruce, pine, deciduous, aspen, eucalyptus,
bench, birch, are some of the pulps made from these trees. The pulp is clean, white bulky opaque and
uniform sheet, which is particularly suitable for printing paper. A pure form of wood pulp obtained by
cutting wood into small pieces and subjecting it to chemical treatment. This removes the natural gums
and resin leaving a soft pure pulp. The other category of wood pulp is mechanical wood pulp or ground
wood pulp. It is so called because; the wood logs are mechanically ground down almost to saw dust. The
shortness of fibres caused by this drastic grinding process and the impurities left in the pulp produce a
paper lacking in strength and of poor colour. Papers produced from chemical wood pulp are stronger
cleaner paper.
Straw:
The stems of the common cereal of which wheat is the most important from the pulp-making aspect
although wet and benley straws can be used. Straw is sometimes used with rag to make thin writing paper
like banks and bonds paper. The straw gives a film rattle and a hard surface and a high bursting strength.
The straw cooked with time has been used in the unbleached state for many years for the production of
straw boards.
Jute:
The best tissue of an annual Indian Plant it is widely used in sack making (gunny) and it is in this form that
it comes to pulp mill. It is used for thin wrapping.
Bagasse:
It is the fibrous residue from the sugarcane after extracting the juice. It is suitable for corrugated paper
and board.
Bamboo:
It was developed as a source of paper pulp in India. It is widely used with grasses. Its general characteristic
resembles that of esparto.
Ramie or china grass:
A special fiber, gives the pulp for making thin strong paper such as Bible paper.
CATEGORIES OF FIBRES
The four main categories of fibre are:
Animal fibres - leather, silk
Mineral fibres - glass, mica, asbestos
Man-made fibres - nylon, rayon, synthetics
Vegetable fibres - The main source of fibres for paper making.
MANUFACTURE OF PAPER
The papermaking process can be divided into three distinct elements:
1. Pulping
2. Papermaking and
3. Finishing
1. Pulping process
Paper is made from the cellulose fibres that are present in hardwood and softwood trees . Whether using
wood or recovered paper, the first step is to dissolve the material into pulp.
Regardless of the type of pulping process used, the wood or recovered paper is broken down into its
component elements so that the fibres can be separated. The pulping results in a mass of individual fibres
being produced. The fibres are then washed and screened to remove any remaining fibre bundles. The
water is then pressed out and the residue is dried.
The pulp is then ready to be used directly or it can be bleached and made into white paper. In an
'integrated paper mill' the pulp will be fed directly to a paper machine. Alternatively, it will be dried and
pressed into bales ready for use as a raw material in paper mills worldwide.
The pulp-making process
1. Timber and debarking
2. Chipping machine and pulping process
3. Cleaning and bleaching
4. Washing and drying
Pulp is graded and classified according to: the method of the production (e.g. chemical or mechanical
pulp); the species of tree used (e.g. softwood or hardwood); and by level of processing (e.g. bleached or
unbleached). Pulp generated from recovered paper is similarly graded.
Three basic methods of pulping wood fibre can be used:
A. Mechanical pulping removes the lignin from the fibres by physical means;
B. Mechanical / Chemical pulping removes the lignin by a mixture of physical and chemical means; and
C. Chemical pulping removes the lignin by entirely chemical methods.
D. Recycled or deinked pulp (DIP) removing printing inks and other unwanted elements.
A. Mechanical pulping
The selected trees are cut into suitable lengths and debarked in a rolling, open drum called a tumbler
drum debarker. The debarked logs are forced against a revolving grindstone in hot water. While water is
being sprayed on simultaneously, the individual fibres are ripped out of the wood and are crushed, scored,
pressed, turn off, and sheared by the grindstone surface. The resulting mixture of pulp and water is sent
over a series of increasingly fine screens, which remove any remaining lumps until the final mixture is well
dissolved.
B. Mechanical/chemical pulping
A number of processes have been devised to produce mechanical pulps. They mainly involve the use of
woodchips as the starting point of the process sequence rather than whole logs.
The first common step in the process is that, after cutting and debarking, the logs (or wood scraps) are
fed into a chipper, which reduces them to chips, a few millimeters in length.
End-use: this pulp has properties suited to tissue manufacture. Some chemi-thermo mechanical pulp is
used in printing and writing grades.
C. Chemical Pulping
Chemical pulp is the fibre material obtained from wood (chips) and other vegetable raw materials (e.g.,
annuals including hemp, jute, esparto, straw, cotton) by chemical digestion.
The aim of chemical pulping is to reduce or dissolve the lignins in the wood by chemical rather than
physical means. In this way the fibres separate more cleanly from each other and fewer impurities remain
in the final stock.
Chemical pulping yields the purer and stronger forms of pulp known as wood free (ie, free of ground wood
pulp). As much as the chemical treatment itself, the absence of mechanical forces which tear and bruise
the fibres means that fibre lengths can be maintained and a stronger, more resilient paper be
manufactured.
Two main processes are used:
1. The sulfate (or alkaline) method - An alkaline process, sometimes known as the kraft process, it can be
used for softwoods and hardwoods equally. Approximately 85% of the chemical pulp produced worldwide
is sulfate pulp. Caustic soda (sodium hydroxide - NaOH), sodium sulfide (Na2S) known as white liquor are
cooked with a continuous feed of woodchips inside a continuous digester (Kamyr digester). During
combustion sodium sulfate is reduced to sodium sulfide by the organic carbon in the mixture. After only
2-3 hours the fibres separate easily and so maintain their full lengths, yielding a pulp which will form
strong and will form paper. The process yield is high and effluent disposal relatively easy. This pulp has a
lower degree of whiteness. Sulphate (or Kraft) pulp: pulp produced by cooking wood chips in pressure
vessels in the presence of sodium hydroxide (soda) liquor. The pulp may be unbleached or bleached.
End-use: widespread uses - pulp used for graphic papers, tissue and carton board, wrappings, sack and
bag papers, envelopes and other speciality papers.
2. The sulfite (or acid) method - Most modem pulp mills run the more environmentally friendly sulfate
method the sulfite method is the older traditional one.
The sulfite process produces wood pulp which is almost pure cellulose fibers by using various salts of
sulfurous acid to extract the lignin from wood chips in large pressure vessels called digesters. The salts
used in the pulping process are either sulfites (SO32−), or bisulfites (HSO3−), depending on the pH. The
pulping liquor for most sulfite mills is made by burning sulfur with the correct amount of oxygen to give
sulfur dioxide, which is then absorbed into water to give sulfurous acid.
2. Bleaching
Pulp is bleached for a number of reasons. To produce high quality paper a pulp is required which does not
discolour during storage or go yellow when exposed to sunlight, and which retains its strength. Bleaching
achieves all three requirements and has the additional advantage of improving absorption capacity,
removing any small pieces of bark or wood left behind as well as giving a high level of purity.
3. Breaking
Breaking is the process of returning the pulp sheets to liquid form. It is carried out in a hydrapulper or
slusher, a large circular metal tank in which the sheets of pulp are dissolved and mixed in water. This is
the point at which a number of other ingredients will be added.
i) Sizing Agents:
Addition of some sticky substances to the fibres, and loading materials to bind them together is called
sizing. The sizing materials are added inside the furnish to improve a paper’s waterresistance and prevent
ink from ‘feathering’ on its surface when the paper is printed. Sizing gives paper an improved finish, reduce
fluffing.
ii) Loadings, fillers, and coloring materials:
These are minerals or compounds added to the stock to improve the opacity,
formation, printability, dimensional stability or other characteristics in the finished paper. Printings and
writings paper commonly contain up to 15% - 25% of fillers by weight. Other papers, designed for strength
and rugged use, such as bond and ledger papers, may contain only 2% - 6% of fillers. The most common
fillers are: china clay, calcium carbonate, titanium dioxide etc.
iii) Chemical additives
antifoamers: to disperse the froth or foam produced during stock preparation.
retention aids: to keep the fillers in the paper from falling through the wire of the papermaking machine.
Include sodium silicate, gum.
slimicides: chemicals to keep down the presence of slime-producing microbes. Include chlorine,
chloramines.
Colouring materials Dyestuffs / Pigments, and whitening agents are added to improve the whiteness of
paper or to produce colored papers.
4. Sheeting and Drying: the pulp is fed to rotatory screen and goes to head box. Head box controls the
GSM of the paper. The pulp at this stage contains very high water content (over 90%). A canvas or belt
with vacuum suction system serves to extract excess water from the pulp. The system is called press
section. During this process 60% of water is drained off. Woollen belt carries paper from first press section
to second, the Dryer Section. Here, the paper is heated through steam at 70 – 80 degree Celcius.
5. Calendaring: The steel cylinders are used to compress the paper to smooth the surface of the sheet.
6. Winder: At this time, a winder is used to rolls the sheet.
7. Cutter: It cuts the sheets in required size.
FORENSIC ANALYSIS OF PAPER
It is done by: Physical examination, Chemical examination, Microscopic examination.
1. Physical examination:
Physical examination of paper involves the examination of paper by merely looking at the paper via the
naked eyes. Here, we examine the:
Colour- The colour of the paper is compared with the other documents in question or with the standard
document (if available). The changes in colour of the paper due to storing conditions, reactions of the
environment, yellowing of paper naturally or artificially is also observed.
Thickness - Measured using micrometer / caliper.
Condition – The condition of paper is determined by the environmental conditions in which it is being
stored. The paper stored in safe inside a book case will be in much better condition as compared to that
which is kept in a open or damp place. The deterioration in the condition of paper depends on the amount
of light to which they are exposed, moisture, wind, temperature, etc. conditions.
Tearing resistance/ strengths - It is the ability of the paper to withstand any tearing force when it is
subjected to.
Tensile Strength- The ability of the paper to withstand the stress and strain applied to it before breaking
down and pulling apart.
Dimensions – The papers available in the market are of standard size/dimensions (length, breadth/width,
diameter, GSM), whose data is readily available with the manufactures. If the expert is able identify the
make and model of the paper under question then its dimensions can be compared with the standard
dimensions. Also the papers of the document under question should be compared with each other to give
an idea of any torn/removal of paper portion from the original paper.
Appearance – Texture, colour, dimension, transparency, staple holes, pin holes, grease and folds,
indentation marks, printing and writing. These features are observed in the questioned document and
any discrepancy if seen is made note of.
Smoothness - The even and consistent continuity of the paper''s surface. How the paper receives the ink
is affected by the smoothness of the surface.
Opacity - A measure used to describe how much the paper will block the ink from showing through the
sheet
Fold –The fold (if present) are carefully observed under the stereomicroscope to check if a fold has been
done before writing on it or vice versa. This observation makes it possible to gain the knowledge whether
the writing is made on the fold or under the fold. Also the number and depth/prominence of fold marks
help us in identifying the substitution made, if any.
Folding Endurance - The ability of the paper to hold up to multiple foldings before breaking
Florescence – Some papers shows specific florescence under UV-light which adds on to their safety and
uniqueness, which is helpful identifying and authenticating such papers.
Watermarks –It is an important physical characteristic which help in comparison and dating of paper.
2. Chemical examination:
Chemical examination of paper is done to estimate the presence of various components like starch, glue,
clay, titanium oxide or paraffin wax etc. Also to determine the specific dyes used. The type of bleaching
agent added.
Dye examination: it is done by using specific chemical reagents to test the presence or absence of a
specific dye. The reagents used are dye specific and target the trace elements present in the dye.
Glazing material: it is done by micro-chemical analysis for the examination of glue, starch, or any other
gelatinous matter.
Ash Determination: Questioned document and control sample both are carried upon a flame and the
colour of flame, weight of ash, smell of gases released, etc. is carefully observed.
Microscopic examination:
Colour examination: it is done by visual observation, under UV light of short wavelength (254nm) or in
longer wavelength (366nm).
Trace elemental analysis: it may be possible that many trace elements are present in small quantity on
the paper. It can be done through Neutron activation analysis (NAA), Atomic absorption and emission
spectroscopy, energy dispersive analysis.
Fibre analysis: it is possible for papers to have same water marks and other physical characteristics but
still have entirely different fibre and chemical composition. In fibre analysis, one has to establish the type
of fibre like cotton, wood or synthetic, etc. it is primarily done through microscopic examination and
observing the morphological characteristics of fibre.