UV matte ink, also known as imitation metal etching ink, is a new type of UV curable ink. The preferred printing method is screen printing. The substrate is mostly gold, silver cardboard or other paper-plastic composite materials with strong mirror effect and drying method. UV UV light curing. Because of its strong sand-feeling, it is beautiful, elegant, and generous, and it has been promoted very quickly. In a few short years, it has occupied a considerable proportion in high-end packaging and printing fields such as cigarette packs, wine bags, and cosmetics.
However, due to the low investment threshold of the ink, the level of the recipe designer is uneven, and the available raw materials are involved in a wide range; and the ink is currently not available at the international or domestic level. Therefore, in the printing process, especially in large-volume industrial production, there are inevitably problems with this or that, talk about UV matte ink in the formulation process should consider several factors for the reference of their peers.
First, UV matte ink printability
In general, when UV-based matte inks are printed in small batches, there are basically no serious printing problems. However, problems occur when high-volume high-speed production is performed using a full-body screen printer. If thousands of sheets or tens of thousands of sheets are printed, the UV matte ink cannot be completely spread on the screen, resulting in a uniform state in the matte state; the UV matte ink is too thin or poor in compatibility, resulting in edge running, bottom exposure, and the like. To solve this kind of problem, first of all pay attention to the following three points in UV matte ink formulation:
1, to ensure that the UV thixotropy of the matte ink is relatively good, relatively thick at rest, relatively thin when printing;
2, to ensure that UV matte ink has a suitable viscosity, the screen has a suitable adhesion;
3, to ensure that UV matte ink has a suitable dilute consistency.
Second, UV matte ink raw material quality
There are residues when printing large quantities of UV matte ink. This is a headache for many printers, because the large amount of residue not only increases the cost of printing manufacturers, but also seriously affects the production efficiency. In the design of UV matte inks, careful examination of the raw materials used must be performed.
1, to ensure that the size of raw materials and screen mesh match;
2, to ensure that a variety of raw materials, good compatibility, no chemical reaction, at the same time there is a good printability, high over-web rate; Third, according to the requirements of preservation (shady place, sealed, protected from light) and under normal conditions ( 20-26 °C) printing, no dark reaction, even the smallest gel or photosensitive reaction, it will lead to printability decline, over-web rate.
Third, UV matte ink ingredients
Some printing manufacturers may use gold and silver cardboard, which are of relatively poor quality, in order to reduce costs. The gold color of the UV-abrasive ink on the micro-soluble gold card paper is prone to occur. In serious cases, even the gold is completely dissolved and the entire printing process is completed. The product is white. Then, to overcome this type of problem, when designing a UV matte ink formulation, it is necessary to consider the composition of various raw materials in a comprehensive manner so as to ensure that the proportion of the large molecular weight and the low molecular weight component does not allow the relatively small molecular weight material to dissolve the gold card. The background color. Of course, reducing the amount of exposure and shortening the time from printing to curing of printed products will also have a better effect on overcoming the whiteness of printed products.
Fourth, UV matte ink drying problem
Due to the different UV lamps used by various printing manufacturers, the power is not the same, the printing speed is not the same, so it may cause the use of the same UV matte ink, curing in one manufacturer is not transparent, but in another manufacturer has cured, photosensitive There are too many agents remaining. If it is not cured, it will stick to it, and if there is too much residual photosensitizer, it will increase the odor of the printed matter. Therefore, UV matte ink formulations must be highly targeted and must fully understand the printing equipment manufacturers, the number of UV lamps, power, and printing speed.
Then according to the actual situation, on the one hand to ensure the appropriate drying speed, so that the residual amount as small as possible; In addition, as far as possible the use of odorless photosensitizer, you can ensure that the UV matte ink is basically odorless after curing, and not anti-adhesion.
In short, in the design of UV matte ink formulations, it is necessary to fully understand the performance of various raw materials in UV matte inks, conduct a comprehensive and accurate inspection of compatibility, stability, and printability. After repeated trials and trials, we must constantly explore And improvements to make the UV matte ink composition more in line with the printing manufacturer's requirements.
