Pahka

I'm often thinking about the course of self destruction our economy seems to be on. That usually leads me to think of what might be difficult to obtain if things continue to get worse. I've been trying to figure out how to gain some additional skills related to items that I've become accustomed to having around. With 3 small kids we go through a lot of paper (or dry erase boards, but those are only as good as the marker stays dry) as they practice drawing and writing. Paper weighs a lot and I'm not sure if I can really stockpile it when the limited space in our small house is reserved for food and camping supplies - yes, elbow room is often in short supply.

So, I decided to see if I could figure out how to make some paper. I haven't tried it yet, but I thought that if we're going to be growing our own food sometime in the future I'll have a ready supply of material for paper pulp, and I should learn how to use the parts of the plants that I'd normally toss.

I found this information on making paper from rice, bamboo and/or mulberry and thought I'd share in case anyone else had a desire to learn it as well.

Note: The caustic solution described in the article that comes from the wood ash appears to be lye and is also useful in making home made soap.

Note 2: The definition of "Culm" from Wikipedia: Culm, in botanical context, originally referred to a stem of any type of plant. It is derived from the Latin word for 'stalk' (culmus) and now specifically refers to the above-ground or aerial stems of grasses and sedges. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Culm

Note 3: The definition of "Deckle" from Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DeckleIn (manual) papermaking, a deckle is a belt used along with a mold to gather up woodpulp from a vat for pressing and drying into sheets. It helps to control the size of the paper produced. Paper with a feathered or soft edge is often said to have a "deckled" edge for this reason (as opposed to a cut edge).
Paper can have two types of deckled edge: natural deckles or tear deckles. Natural deckles are the result of the deckle used in mould-made paper, whereas tear deckles are the result of tearing the paper. Often mould-made paper will have a combination of deckled and cut edges depending on the specific size of paper required.
In film processing, deckles are die inserts that set the coating width of a slot die coater or the extrusion width of an extrusion die. They work by constraining the flow as the material exits the die. Since some materials have a tendency to neck in or spread out after leaving the die, deckle position may need to be compensated to achieve the target width.

See the link below for the original article.
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Making Your Own Rice Paper

http://www.rice-paper.com/about/makeyourown.html

By following instructions below you can make an attractive rice paper, fine or textured, from rice straw, bamboo, or mulberry. Homemade papers may not [appear/feel] like fine papers from China, but they bear the character of their maker.

Pulping. Rice Straw Bamboo Mulberry

Equipment

• A rust-proof pail
• A stainless steel pot
• A mortar and pestle or bat and board
• A large boiling pot
• A sharp knife
• Wood ash
• Rubber gloves
• Sieves

Rice Straw Pulping

1. Prepare rice straw by cutting them about 1 inch long and strip off the leaves. The nodes in stem aren't great for papermaking. Chop them off and use only the straight stiff segments of stems between nodes.
2. Soak the straw in a pail of cold water for a week or longer. When the water turns yellowish brown with pigment leaching out of the stems, change the water a few times during the soaking. Rinse the soaked straw thoroughly.
3. Caustic solution is made from wood ash which may from your fireplace. Using wood ash solution for papermaking is time consuming, but it help yield stronger paper due to its gentle action and tendency to rinse out easily. The measurement of wood ash solution is made of 26 ounces of wood ash and 15 quarts of water for one pound of dry rice straw fiber. Boil wood ash for about half an hour and let it settle. On following day sieve the mixture into a stainless steel pot. If some ash managed to get through the sieve, line the sieve with a sheet of paper towel and filter the solution again. The solution is highly caustic - time for rubber gloves.
4. Cook soaked straw in a large boiling pot filled with the caustic solution. It takes about three hours to break up the fibers. The rice straw is ready when it crumbles when pinched. Do not overcook the fiber. If it tears apart too easily, your paper will be weak. Rinse the cooked straw in cool water.
   
   
5. Pound the cooked rice straw with a bat. Use some force, but allow the weight of the bat to do most of the work. The initial beating loosens the fiber strands and spreads them out. When the fiber has spread out, fold the fiber on themselves and repeat the beating until the fibers crushed into pulp.
   
   

Bamboo Pulping

1. You can use bamboo leaves, branches and culms for your paper. If a fine rice paper is desired, use culms. Shred the plant material as finely as possible. A food processor may be helpful.
2. Put 1 kg of shredded bamboo in a boiling pot, and fill it with the caustic solution as discussed above. Cook the bamboo about five hours. Test the bamboo fiber by feeling it. It is ready when it feels slippery.
3. Sieve cooked bamboo through a fine screen. A nylon stocking can be an substitute. Wrap the fiber and wash it in clean fresh water, squeezing the bulge in the wrapping under the running water until it is clean.
4. Remove the fiber from the wrapping and beat it until it is pulpy.

Mulberry Pulping

1. Harvest mulberry branches that about 1 inch in diameter and about 8 feet in length.
2. Cut the branches into even length that fit into a big pot. Place a vegetable steamer in the bottom of the pot and fill with about 2 inches of water. Put branches in the pot vertically and cover tightly with a lid. Steam the branches for at least 30 minutes, or until the bark shrinks back and is easy to peel away from the woody core.
   
   
3. Strip inner bark from the mulberry branches while they are still warm. Make a vertical slit at the bottom of the mulberry branch to get the entire inner and outer bark in your hand. Scrape outer bark off the inner bark. Scraping off the outer bark ensures that your rice paper will turn out pure and white.
4. Wash the stripped inner bark and pick out any remaining specks of outer bark. Cook damp mulberry fiber in wood ash solution for about 4 hours. Stir it occasionally until it pulls apart easily.
5. Rinse the cooked fiber twice by dunking it into a bucket of clean water. Squeeze out the excess water and hand beat the bark fiber into pulp. If the fiber seems dry during beating, add some clear water.

Sheet Forming

Equipment

• Deckle and mould
• Vat
• A rust-proof pail
• Felts.
• Pressing board
• Rolling pin

To make a sheet of paper successfully you will need two wooden frames - deckle and mould. The top frame is deckle, which is removable and determines edge and size of paper and keeps the pulp on the mould. Thickness of deckle ensures consistent thickness of paper. The bottom frame is mould. With a screen of fine bamboo strips stretched over, it drains the water from the pulp. The bamboo screen is hard to come by, but you can make Western deckle and mould quite easily. The wood frames of both deckle and mould are 3/8 x 3/8 inch in thickness. They must be the same size. Cover the mould with some fine wire gauze or plastic mesh.

1. Fill a vat halfway with water. The vat should at least seven inches deep and two inches larger than your deckle and mould. Add fiber pulp to the vat and give your pulp a good stir. While the pulp still moving, dip your mould-and-deckle, front edge first, into the pulp. Lift it out of the vat and give it a little shake. This will let fibers woven together for a stronger paper.
   
   
2. Drain the water for about five minutes. Take off the deckle. Do this carefully. If water dropped onto newly formed sheet by accident, take your mould back to the vat.
3. Smoothly but not too slowly roll the mould, paper side down, onto a wet felt, or a blotting paper, with a stack of newspaper underneath. This will drive away the air between the paper and felt. Gently remove the mould. Place a piece of wet felt or blotting paper over the newly-made paper and couch another sheet of paper over it. Repeat this process until you have as many sheets as you want.
   
   
4. Press out the water from the paper stack with a rolling pin. Dry each sheet of paper together with felt.

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