Modeling and simulation of paperboard edge wicking

When liquid packaging board is made aseptic in the filling machine the unsealed edges of the board are exposed to hydrogen peroxide. A high level of liquid penetration may lead to aesthetic as well as functional defects. To be able to make a priori predictions of the edge wicking properties of a certain paperboard material is therefore of great interest to paper industry as well as to packaging manufacturers. The aim of this paper is to present a new analytical theory for prediction of the edge wicking properties of paperboard. The theory is based on Darcy's law and the ideal gas law to describe the physical behavior of water flow in paperboard. The theory is compared to a recently published multi-scale framework and with pressurized edge wick experiments. The agreement is very good for paperboard samples of different sizes. The conclusion from the work is that both analytical theory and detailed simulations are useful to predict edge wicking properties of paperboard material.