Wednesday 2 May 2012

Printing Quality of Inks

To write a letter to your friend, you would need a pen. To make a new chapter of your book, you would need a typewriter. To create a leaflet, brochure or poster, ink is indispensable in order to print them. To print a document from your computer, ink is necessary to do the job. Almost everything that surrounds us has a part that ink is applied onto.

But what is ink? Ink is a liquid or paste containing pigments or dyes. In the past, inks used to be obtained from fruit or vegetable juices or octopuses. Ink has a very long history of use and the ways of obtaining it and applying have developed to new forms. Nowadays, ink is split into 2 types - printing and also the writing inks. The previous is additionally classified into ink for digital or litho printing that uses inkjet, electrographic, screen-printing and offset printing technologies.

The original article can be found on our blog.

Ink is a material used not only for writing but for printing requirements too. A lot of people are not aware of factors that matter when choosing the right inks to boost the quality of their printing job.
The question which we want to talk about in this article is "How to find out which ink is high-quality"? There are four major factors that can tell about quality of your ink and these are color, surface tension, pH and viscosity.

Color. It's the foremost apparent factor. Coloured inks are sometimes made up of linseed oil, soybean oil and solvent with organic pigments. Black ink, on the opposite hand, came from carbon black. These inks embrace additives like lubricants, waxes, surfactants and dying agents.

Surface Tension. This measures the cohesive energy in an interface. To precisely measure what is the surface tension, surface tensiometer is important. Inaccuracy in surface tension may result in unsuitable droplet formation and so droplets are bad for printing quality.

pH. It refers to the alkalinity or acidity of the ink. The pH value that ranges from 0-6 is acidic whereas pH value seven is considered as neutral. The pH level of eight to fourteen is considered alkaline. Higher acidity or alkalinity might injury the print heads.

Viscosity. It's the flow rate or measure of the fluid's resistance to deformation. It's closely associated to being thick.

I hope this brief information has helped you to understand what key factors need to be considered when choosing your ink that is best suitable for printing industry. Remember that the printing quality is very important in the industry and so you must ensure you use inks that only guarantee high quality prints.

The original article can be found on our blog.

No comments:

Post a Comment