Talking about flexographic printing, DuPont's Cyrel flexible printing plate can not be ignored. DuPont invented the photosensitive resin flexo printing plate 26 years ago to bring the first revolution to quality in flexo printing, making the flexible printing process that can only print some rough package printing products enter the hall of high-grade packaging products from then on. . In European and North American flexographic printing, the field of packaging and printing has been evenly divided with offset printing and gravure printing. In the printing of corrugated boxes, flexographic printing is more of a rule.
One of the main features of flexible printing is its wide range of printed products. It can print plastic films, logos, folding boxes, beverage boxes, corrugated cardboard, cardboard, kraft paper, etc., as well as for offset printing.
Based on this feature, flexible printing requires different printing plates. DuPont's Cyrel photosensitive flexographic printing plates have evolved from a single variety, single thickness and size since its inception to today's dozens of varieties and a variety of thicknesses and sizes. Here are just a few of the commonly used varieties to introduce.
Cyrel EXL
It is an all-around printing plate that can print almost all types except corrugated cardboard, such as plastic films, labels, handbags, folding cartons, envelopes, and beverage boxes.
Its printing features are: high printing plate resolution, suitable for printing fine lines, sharp renewal and small anti-yin text.
The printed surface of the EXL is accompanied by a purple-blue film. It can better transfer ink. In addition, the contrast between the color of the purple film and the printing plate can help the security personnel to quickly and accurately mount the plate.
Another great feature of the EXL is its exposure latitude, which means that it is possible to expose very fine negative characters and fine dots on the same plate.
EXL's printing life is also very long. There have been millions of prints of printed drinks in China.
The EXL is moderate in hardness and has a Shore hardness of 50-60°. Therefore, it can print both on-site and on-site printing. This, of course, depends on the specific conditions of the printer.
EXL plate image parameters: Consecutive adjustment in the printing plate shows a dot range of 1-95%; the minimum diameter of the independent dot is 0.250 mm; the minimum width of the independent fine line is 0.175 mm; the text depth is 0.75-1.10 Mm.
Cyrel UXL
Compared with EXL, it is an economic printing plate. Its main feature is the absence of EXL's purple film. UXL's printing range is consistent with EXL and also has excellent exposure latitude. UXL also has moderate hardness, with a Shore hardness of 48-58°, slightly softer than EXL.
Cyrel TDR
DuPont's famous flexo plate brand. It is dedicated to the direct printing of corrugated cardboard.
TDR is characterized by its Shore hardness of 34-41 °, very soft, and therefore, it is suitable for printing corrugated board, cement paper bags, cardboard and other surface roughness of the substrate.
There are also a variety of TDR thicknesses, which are commonly used in China at 3.94 mm and 7.00 mm. DuPont recommends the use of a 3.94 mm TDR because this saves money and the printing quality is excellent.
The characteristics of the plate image of TDR are: continuous modulation range: 3-95%; minimum diameter of independent circle is 0.60 mm; minimum width of independent line is 0.25 mm; depth of text is 2.50-3.50 mm.
TDR is transparent and not only looks beautiful but also easy to install. TDR's text relief is clean and sharp, suitable for printing fine corrugated cardboard designs.
TDR can be said to be the ace version of printed corrugated cardboard.
Celie NOW
NOW printing plate is the latest variety introduced by DuPont. Its most outstanding feature is that Wentu's depth is extremely high, and its resolution is high. It is especially suitable for printing small strokes of Chinese characters with complex strokes. Therefore, it will become the leading product of flexible printing plates in the Asian market. DuPont has launched NOW in Hong Kong and Taiwan in China. In the second half of this year, it will be fully listed in mainland China.
NOW prints like EXL and UXL and is used to print pre-printed plastic films, labels, beverage boxes, folding boxes, and corrugated cardboard.
NOW falls in the thin range. Its thickness is between 1.14 mm and 2.84 mm.
NOW's exposure latitude is great, and its curvature is very good. It can be mounted on rollers with very small diameters. NOW's Shore hardness is much higher than EXL, between 60-82 inches. Therefore, it is more suitable for continuous and fine-tune Chinese text printing.
NOW not only has a long printing life, but also has a good ability to resist ozone and sunlight, which is beyond the ordinary photosensitive resin flexographic printing plate.
In short, NOW is a kind of high-tech product adopting the latest resin technology, which will bring flexo printing to a higher level.
Cyrel DRC
DRC is a new product developed for direct printing of corrugated cardboard, like TDR plates. The main difference between it and TDR is that its hard bottom is bigger than TDR, and its hard bottom is between 37-42 inches. The purpose is to meet the demand of some users for hard plates.
In addition, DRC's color is much lighter than TDR's, and the transparent bottom is high, allowing the press to press the bottom line. Another feature of DRC is that the exposure time is shorter than TDR, mainly to meet the requirements of low energy lamps (most domestic lamps) used by some domestic manufacturers.
DRC has a large depth of text, high resolution, and clear, delicate prints, making it particularly suitable for the printing of Chinese characters.
DRC is a new product that DuPont has just launched. It will be fully listed in China in the second half of this year.
Several of the DuPont companies listed above are the most common varieties in China's mainland. In addition, DuPont also has PLS, HOS, HOF, CL, UVP, PLB and other varieties.
So many varieties, as a user to choose which one is suitable for their own needs? To answer this question there are several principles to follow:
1) The thicker the surface of the substrate, the thicker the plate. For example, printing a plastic film requires a plate with a thickness of 1.14 mm. Dalian Connaught, Shanghai's Tiger and Ziquan use 45EXL plates.
2) Printing Continuously reconciling very fine text should use high-rigid printing plates. In flexographic printing, the same colors, dots, and fields are used for making and printing. The hard printing plate outlets have a small expansion, and the printing continuously adjusts the light part to perform well. The soft printing plate has good softness and can completely fit with the printing material, so the printing field is even and thick. This also explains why the flexo printers have very many color groups, at least not less than six color groups.
3) In addition to the factors of printing, we must also look at our work environment. If the concentration of ozone in our production plant is concentrated, we should choose flexible printing plates with strong ozone resistance, such as: HOF, HOS, and NOW. In this way, the printing plate is not easily cracked during printing, and the printing life is long.
4) The use of printing inks often requires special printing plates to cooperate. If we use UV fast-drying ink we should choose Celloli UVP printing plate. If you want to glazing offset products, you should use Flexi plates of the Celie CL variety.
DuPont scientists are tirelessly developing new processes for the development of new photosensitive resin flexographic plates and plates.
At the Drupa Printing Fair in Dusseldorf, Germany in 1995, DuPont introduced the world’s first digital laser imaging system (Cyrel R Digital Imager), which has made the quality of printing plates and printing effects unprecedented, that is, the ability to print with offsets. The quality is comparable to the second revolution in flexographic printing.
In conjunction with this system, DuPont introduced new types of printing plates, such as DPS and DPH. Taking DPS as an example, we can see the profound significance of this revolution by looking at the technical parameters of its surface. When DPS is at 120 lines/inch, the dot range is between 0.5-99%; the minimum diameter of the independent dots is 0.127 millimeters; the minimum width of the individual thin lines is 0.102 millimeters.
Digital laser imaging systems and DuPont's DPS and DPH have become standard equipment for flexo printing in North America and Europe. The local flexographic printing manufacturers and plate making manufacturers have turned from traditional methods to digital ones. Buyers of packaging products in North America and Europe are also required to digitally flexibly print products. This trend is fierce.
Although China does not have flexographic digital technology yet, under the conditions of a market economy, digital flexographic technology will sooner or later come. DuPont's DPS and DPH will also enter the Chinese flexo market in the near future.