Paper

Paper is made from wood fibers, which are matted and pressed together to make a thin, flat sheet of paper. These fibers usually come from timber. Some trees such as pine, firs, and spruces are grown especially for this purpose, or they are obtained from natural forests. On the lesser end fibers from other plants such as grasses and reed are used to make special kinds of paper. More often cotton rage and waste paper are used as additional raw materials.

The general process for making paper begins in a factory close to a forest or plantation, where logs are ground up and wetted down to make wood pulp.

The pulp is cleaned, dried and pressed into bales and transported to a paper mill. At the paper mill the pulp is fed into a stock preparer, together with any raw material, such as recycled waste paper and water. Here all the coarse fibers are beaten and mixed till they have the right consistency.
Fillers such as china clay, which make the paper smoother, are then added. So also are the dyes, in case the paper needs to be colored, and a substance called size, which make the paper easier to write on.

This pulp mixture together in known as stock, and then is fed into a paper making machine, which may be more than 300 feet long. The wet stock is carried along on a moving wire mesh belt, and the water from the stock drains away.
The stock then passes through rollers, which squeeze out more water and mat the wood fibers together. It then passes through heated rollers that remove the rest of the water, pressing and drying the stock into paper. This is rolled up at the dry end of the machine and is ready to be cut and sized for use.