Skip to content
DielineMaker
Start designing free

Materials

Grain direction

Grain direction is the predominant alignment of fibres in a paper or board sheet.

Updated

What it means in packaging

It affects bending, stiffness and the tendency of a fold to crack. Rotating a blank to fit more copies on a sheet can change the relationship between grain and important creases. Corrugated flute direction is a separate structural consideration.

A practical example

Two identical cartons cut at right angles on a sheet can feel different when folded along the same panel edge.

What to check

Agree acceptable rotation and grain constraints before optimising the sheet layout.

Use it in your project

Crease
A crease is a controlled deformation of board that guides a fold without cutting through the material.
Imposition
Imposition arranges one or more designs on a production sheet for printing and subsequent cutting or finishing.
Flute
A flute is the wave-shaped paper layer within corrugated board; flute profiles describe its height and spacing.