Printing on Paper!

The whole printing process begins with paper. Paper comes in a variety of weights and finishes, and every printing company offers different options depending on their paper suppliers and printing equipment. You’ll find the widest variety of paper options with Screen printing because operators are able to calibrate the press based on thickness and coatings. On the other hand, digital printers used for print-on-demand have a limited amount of paper options. While paper can be printed by other printing methods, only Screen printing offers the advantage of UV printing.

UV screen printing (or UV coating) amplifies the effect of the special inks printed using traditional screen printing frames and the dried in special furnaces with UV rays.

UV screen printing enhances the colours, adding brightness to the images and allowing high precision coatings down to the last small detail, both in large and small formats.
UV screen printing also perfectly covers any background, even darker than the printing colour, without affecting the colour's shade.

The UV screen printing technique also helps create different types of effects using a special UV coating: embossed printing, glossy and matte finish, pigment inks with special effects, rough and glitter textures, and transparent printing.

The UV coating is also suitable for printing on various media, including all types of paper and PVC, emphasising the colours of your work with the gloss and matte finishes, embossed letters, glitter, pearlescent or metallic paints... UV screen printing adds value and enhances your work, without any particular limits of application.

Uses of UV Ink in Screen Printing

UV inks are used to print on smooth surfaces. UV inks are commonly used in screen printing for decals, nameplates, signage, metal decoration, container decoration and automotive artwork, as well as for industrial applications. UV inks often contain additives to tailor the ink to the proper screen printing application. Specialty UV inks, such as glitter inks, also are available. There are even UV inks that create prints that attract magnets, making them ideal for display signage that needs to be changed out frequently.

In recent years probably no area of screenprinting has developed faster than UV printing. As a commercially viable technology its history is barely three decades old, but today it competes readily with the solvent-based screenprinting inks

Despite UV’s somewhat troubled childhood, maturity has brought it wider acceptance, and in some areas of screenprinting it is even beginning to dominate. Today, virtually all CDs and DVDs are screenprinted using UV inks, and UV is seen as screenprinting’s best hope in the ongoing battle with digital print technologies. 

The principal reasons for this rapid growth are two-fold. For one thing, UV inks dry very rapidly. (We’re talking three seconds or less!) For another, UV inks are about as environmentally friendly as you can get, because they produce almost no emissions. Unlike conventional inks, UV inks contain no solvents. The solvents in air-dry screenprinting inks evaporate as the inks dry releasing Volatile Organic Compounds (VOCs) into the atmosphere. VOCs have been a prime target in the battle against air pollution because they are a key contributor to harmful pollutants like ground-level ozone. Some VOCs are classed as Hazardous Air Pollutants (HAPs) and are subject to special regulatory controls under the Clean Air Act.

What is UV printing exactly? 

UV inks do not actually dry, they cure. The reason is quite simple; there is nothing in UV inks to dry. Although they appear to be as liquid as any solvent-based ink, they are actually solids. They remain in liquid form however, until they come into contact with ultraviolet light. And then, they cure instantly. This ability has made large-scale screenprinting operations competitive with other print technologies, and it’s little wonder that UV inks would come to dominate wherever production speed is critical.

No waiting around for prints to dry, no storage racks to hold drying substrate, and no bulky heat-drying equipment, UV can make a big difference to the speed and efficiency of conventional print operations. When printing multicolor jobs, the second color can be printed almost immediately. Some new high-production presses can print several colors at once by passing prints through intermediate UV curing stages. Prints can be handled and packed for shipping the minute they emerge from the curing unit.

Another interesting feature of UV inks is that when they cure almost the entire ink deposit is transformed into a solid. In fact, UV inks are 100% solids. As the solvents in a solvent-based ink evaporate, the ink deposit will continue to shrink until only the pigments and resins remain. But with UV ink, everything you print onto substrate stays there.

What are the advantages of using UV? 

So, why then have UV inks become so popular? One obvious reason is their status as an environmentally friendly technology. A screenprinting operation that converts to UV inks can reduce its air-borne emissions dramatically. Because UV inks contain no VOCs, printers using them may qualify for exemptions under state and federal clean air requirements. As solvent-based inks struggle to keep up with increasingly stringent regulations, UV printers will look like a better and better alternative.

A second reason is that because of their rapid curing ability, UV inks can increase production speed. Furthermore, a UV curing unit occupies less space than the drying racks or heating ovens used to dry solvent-based inks. Facilities that formerly operated heat dryers can also find their utility bills dropping. While UV curing units produce heat, it’s nowhere near what a heat-drying unit creates.

Another big advantage of UV inks is that they don’t dry in the screen. Air-dry inks continue to increase in viscosity as you use them because the solvents in them continue to evaporate. UV inks do not increase in viscosity. The result is you don’t have to shut down in the middle of a production run to clean your screen. In some facilities using UV inks, inks are left in the presses overnight.

Because of the fine meshes that can be used, UV inks excel in printing fine four-color work and produce sharper prints. Many printers also combine UV inks with solvent-based inks to take advantage of the benefits provided by both types. Needless to say, such combination jobs have to be approached cautiously and with careful testing to insure compatibility.

 

UV screen printing (or UV coating) amplifies the effect of the special inks printed using traditional screen printing frames and the dried in special furnaces with UV rays.

UV screen printing enhances the colours, adding brightness to the images and allowing high precision coatings down to the last small detail, both in large and small formats.
UV screen printing also perfectly covers any background, even darker than the printing colour, without affecting the colour's shade.

The UV screen printing technique also helps create different types of effects using a special UV coating: embossed printing, glossy and matte finish, pigment inks with special effects, rough and glitter textures, and transparent printing.

The UV coating is also suitable for printing on various media, including all types of paper and PVC, emphasising the colours of your work with the gloss and matte finishes, embossed letters, glitter, pearlescent or metallic paints... UV screen printing adds value and enhances your work, without any particular limits of application.