The Trend of Carpet Digital Printing Technology Development - Part I
Carpet digital printing technology is different from traditional screen printing technology.
Carpet digital printing includes two main technical forms: color paste printing and ink printing, which has become the mainstream application and development direction of the market today.
Regarding the ink-based carpet digital printing technology, the technical categories included are still relatively complex. Although many important technical achievements have been made so far, the future development trend is still full of challenges.
Ink digital printing technology category composition:
Mechinery, Ink, Software, Chemical Agent, Color Fixing, Environmental Protection Technology, Electronics, etc.
The advantages of ink-jet digital printing:
The printing resolution is high, the number of colors is unlimited, and the pattern expression is accurate and rich.
Online software control for automatic color mixing, liquid dyes do not need to be prepared in advance by the customer.
Personalized/Customized production mode is suitable for small batches and multiple varieties.
Nylon and modified polyester yarns can be environmentally friendly and waste-free printing.
The challenges of ink-jet digital printing:
Color control
Coordination of print head, ink and software control
Color fastness
Color control:
It is difficult to accurately control colors, which is related to the range of ink color gamut and software algorithms.
It is difficult to repeat the color accurately, which is related to yarn characteristics and fixing process parameters.
Coordination of print head, ink and software control:
There are many factors that affect the smoothness of ink printing, such as environmental temperature and humidity, nozzle blocking or deflecting jet, ink viscosity and surface tension changes, etc., which will lead to print quality losses, and the diagnosis and analysis are both need experience.
Color fastness:
The dyes that can be used to make inks are based on the number of basic colors, shades, dye uptake, dye uptake rate, compatibility, environmental protection and waste-free printing requirements, etc. have limited options, resulting in color fastness degree (light, washable, etc.) are difficult to achieve perfectly. Need to make a balanced choice according to the different uses of the carpet.