The correlation between the water retention values of fibers by the centrifugation method and maximum content of fiber bonding water by the headspace GC method

Abstract

Abstract This work conducted an investigation on the water retention value (WRV) of pulp fibers measured by the conventional centrifugation method (with a screen filter) and the maximum content of fiber bonding water (MCFBW) measured by a headspace gas chromatography (HS-GC), a method with no fine loss, developed recently. The results showed there is an excellent correlation ( R 2 = 0.988 {R^{2}}=0.988 ) between these two methods. However, the WRVs measured by the centrifugation method are consistent lower than the MCFBWs from the HS-GC method and the absolute differences were significantly increases for the refined pulp fibers, i. e., about 50–70 compared to 30+ for the pulps without treatment. The information from this study provides the insight of the real WRVs of the pulps from different processes.