Flatbed

[MacD]

We currently have a Mutoh 1626UV does a nice job on prints did have my first issue ink peeled off after about a month outside on creoplast. My printer people said use coroplast and make sure I clean boards a certain way, also might need to use a product called Nazdar 7020 UV Digital Adhesion Promoter. My board people said don't use alcohol on it could hurt the charge put on boards. Any thoughts?

Also might move up to a true flatbed Mimaki JFX200 or a Flora machine. Any thoughts on these two?

Thanks

 

[ikarasu]

Are you using OEM ink, or aftermarket ink?

We usually wipe down with alcohol or methanol... Never had a problem. We use a HP Flatbed though.

Coroplast has different grades... The cheaper stuff isn't made as good, and wont be as contaminate free. Maybe try a different brand of coro, see if it works better? You're rep should be able to send you some samples of each that they have... print some fullcolors, throw it out in the sun, and see which works best.

We had a problem with a certain brand... We'd see the ink peeling right after it came off the printer though. We were told it was a bad batch of coro, got it exchanged... same thing, so we switched brands, and out of thousands of signs we do a month, only one was peeling right after it came off the printer. Sometimes the oils/plasticizers can affect the signs, and the cheaper ones arent meant to be printed on.

 

[Weizhen Wu]

Ink adhesion problem is related to ink type, media material, primer and UV curing system.
We are an UV flatbed manufacturer. Using alcohol to clean the surface of media is normal to us. So that is not the problem.
You may need to do some pretreatment on your material.
What is your material? Metal? Glass?

 

[DerbyCitySignGuy]

Make sure you're using UV printable coro. DO clean your coro with alcohol. I'm not even sure what "hurting the charge" means, but if they're talking about some kind of static charge on the board to repel dust and dirt, you definitely want to hurt it, since you're about to shoot ink all over it. It's up to you, but it's worth a few extra cents a board to get better coro. It definitely makes a difference.

 

[SignMeUpGraphics]

Make sure you're using UV printable coro. DO clean your coro with alcohol. I'm not even sure what "hurting the charge" means, but if they're talking about some kind of static charge on the board to repel dust and dirt, you definitely want to hurt it, since you're about to shoot ink all over it. It's up to you, but it's worth a few extra cents a board to get better coro. It definitely makes a difference.

They're talking about the dyne levels. Coroplast is generally run through a corona treatment machine before leaving the factory. This helps ink stick to the surface as it introduces micro fractures to the surface of the material for it to adhere to. This only lasts a few months though, so you need freshly treated coro if you want the ink to adhere properly. You could flame treat the panels too which does the same task, but can be tricky if you're not consistent and comfortable doing it.

 

[DerbyCitySignGuy]

They're talking about the dyne levels. Coroplast is generally run through a corona treatment machine before leaving the factory. This helps ink stick to the surface as it introduces micro fractures to the surface of the material for it to adhere to. This only lasts a few months though, so you need freshly treated coro if you want the ink to adhere properly. You could flame treat the panels too which does the same task, but can be tricky if you're not consistent and comfortable doing it.

Ah, gotcha. Yeah, most the places I've worked burn through coro so fast it doesn't matter. The only time we've had issues is when a distributor sent us coro that had been sitting around.