Combination ink technology (on)

Since more than 20 years after the birth of UV inks, ink manufacturers have been working on the development of composite ink technology as a new technology with great potential for growth. Although this new type of ink technology has been successfully developed in recent years, and all parties have different views on it, however, most people think that the combination of ink technology will have a bright future.
Background of Technology Development for Combination Oil Production Since the late 1960s, UV technology with high gloss, instant drying, and good wear resistance has gradually established a firm position in the coating of printed materials. However, when trying to apply UV coatings to traditional printing ink layers, the situation is extremely unsatisfactory. Due to the large differences in chemical composition between UV coatings and conventional inks, incompatibility between the two affects the coating adhesion.
The printers also found that the high gloss of printed products just after finishing the coating process is difficult to maintain. With the difference in hiding power, formula, substrate and printing process, the surface gloss may drop by nearly 30 points. It is believed that the decrease in the gloss of printed products may be caused by a decrease in the gloss uniformity of the surface of the printed product. The gloss lost in the areas with darker ink and thicker ink layers is greater, while the gloss in the thinner ink layers and non-printed surfaces can be maintained well. This change in gloss after coating treatment, and the unpredictability of this change in gloss, place printers in an awkward position.
However, printers also found that if the printing ink can be fully dried before UV coating, the final print will have a good gloss effect. However, there is a problem that the conventional printing ink needs to be dusted during the drying process to prevent back rubbing. When the dried printing material is sent to the UV coating in this way, the dust particles adhere to the paper. The surface, which gives a fine wrinkle to the smooth UV coating, is also unsatisfactory.
In order to overcome this problem, printers have also found a way to apply a layer of water-based paint on the printed sheets. This can greatly reduce the amount of dust required for drying and achieve a satisfactory coating gloss. However, this method requires the printed product to be coated again by a printing press, or a special coating machine is used for the UV coating of the commercial machine. However, it takes more labor, equipment, materials, and time to go through paper coating or offline coating, which increases the cost of the product.
In an attempt to address these deficiencies, some printer manufacturers have developed a press with two coating units. After the printing is completed, the sheets continue to pass through the two coating units to complete two coats on the traditional printing ink layer. For the first time, water-based coating was applied to a conventional ink ink layer, followed by UV coating to obtain a high-gloss print.
This sounds good, but it is not always easy to do it. The question is still whether the water paint can be completely dry. The actual drying of the waterborne coating requires that the acrylic emulsion in the coating be fully integrated, which inevitably brings about problems in the printing process due to the speed of printing. Despite the introduction of multi-unit printing presses for multi-coating machines, and many attempts have also been made, this method still has a gap in quality compared with on-line coating. Although such printing and coating methods do have some successful examples in actual production, this method has proved to be imperfect with respect to the various types of printing and printing that printers face.
Combinatorial Ink Technology Birth As equipment manufacturers try to make continuous improvements to printing and coating equipment, paint and ink manufacturers are also experimenting with changing materials and process recipes to achieve UV in-line coating on traditional ink layers. Just a few years ago, improvements in ink formulation achieved initial success by combining traditional printing inks with UV material components. The experimental results obtained with this combination of inks are encouraging, but problems still exist. . This combination ink has poor printability on a printing press, poor stability in the ink tank, poor gloss uniformity, and the like. However, in the course of the experiment, it was found that if the UV lamp is placed in front of the UV coating unit, the combined ink can be sufficiently dried to obtain a very high gloss of the UV coating. It is based on this discovery, ink manufacturers finally developed a new generation of combination ink technology.
The purpose of the development of composite ink technology is to improve the gloss of printed products, and the high gloss obtained by the combination of ink technology is the key to solving the problem. With the advent of combination ink technology, printers can now obtain high gloss for UV coating with less investment, opening up a large number of new market opportunities for printers.
The so-called combination ink technology actually combines the traditional ink with a sufficient amount of the UV material component, and before the UV ink coating is applied after the combination ink is printed, the ink layer is thoroughly dried with a UV lamp, and subsequently coated. After the UV coating has been applied and dried, a very uniform high-gloss surface can be obtained for the final print. Traditional UV inks are not as good as traditional inks in terms of dot gain, color registration, and print contrast. The combination ink technology is similar to traditional inks in these respects, and it is obviously better than simply using UV ink technology. (To be continued)