Flexo Forum
- Focus on Press Skills and Operations
Steve Utschig, Consulting Technical Editor, 12/01/2004
Flexographic printing for corrugated has been around as long as narrow-web and wide-web printing—though there are some variables that make flexo printing for corrugated unique. There also is a mindset in corrugated that may have held back the quality improvements that wide-web and narrow-web flexo have realized over the last several years. More - Focus on Press Skills and Operations
Steve Utschig, Consulting Technical Editor, 920/735-4882, utschig@foxvalleytech.com, 09/01/2004
The whole flexographic-printing industry is facing increasing pressure to produce a higher-quality product and still maintain a relatively low cost when compared to offset and gravure. This is true of all the variations of flexo printing including narrow web, wide web and corrugated. It's a challenge to get the costs of the consumables—such as substrates, plates, inks, and yes, even compu... More - What are the challenges of using water- and alcohol-based flexo inks on the same press?
Steve Utschig, Consulting Technical Editor, 920/735-4882, utschig@foxvalleytech.com, 06/01/2004
In today's flexographically printed packaging marketplace, there are more and more applications moving toward water-based inks. This is because of the increased technology in water-ink chemistry and also environmentally driven issues. For this reason the possibility of running water and alcohol chemistries on the same machine becomes very real. More - What are the pros and cons of flexo proofing methods? Part 2
Steve Utschig, 12/01/2003
Proofing continues to be a challenge for the flexographic printing industry. In part one of this series, analog proofing pros and cons were discussed. This article will deal with the three types of digital proofs: remote, soft and hard proofing. Remote proofing There are two basic configurations for remote proofing. More - What are the pros and cons of flexo proofing methods? Part 1
Steve Utschig, 09/01/2003
As long as flexography has been a printing process, matching proofs from the press to proofs approved by the customer has been a challenge. The reason: Most of the current proofing methods were really designed for the offset litho printing process. Fortunately, in the last few years the mindset has changed. More - What are the up and coming prepress technologies for flexo printing?
By Steve Utschig, Consulting Technical Editor, 06/01/2003
The flexographic printing process continues to improve in both quality and consistency in an effort to meet end-user customers' increasing demands. Press manufacturers have met this challenge by developing more accurate printing presses with tighter tolerances in registration, settings, and drying capabilities. More - Flexo Forum
Steve Utschig, 11/01/2002
How can I measure the treat level of a film substrate? Non-porous substrates, such as polyethylene, polypropylene and foils, need to have their surface energies altered in order for the proper flexographic ink adhesion to occur. The general rule of thumb is that the substrate should have a dyne level (surface-energy measurement) of at least 10 dynes higher than the surface energy of the ink a... More - Why is corona treating necessary in the flexo process?
Steve Utschig, Consulting Technical Editor, 08/01/2002
Many materials that are printed flexographically have nonporous surfaces. The most common of these substrates are polyethylene and polypropylene. These nonporous surfaces have low inherent surface energies, causing them to be non-receptive for bonding with printing inks, coatings and adhesives. Other materials, such as foils and some papers, also exhibit low surface energies that can cause conc... More - What is the relationship between ink control and print quality?
Steve Utschig, Consulting Technical Editor, 05/01/2002
There still seems to be some misconceptions in the flexo industry concerning this issue. The confusion begins when trying to make assumptions or comparisons of similarity in ink travel across the ink train between two-roll metering versus enclosed chambered doctor-blade metering. Though both systems are intended to transfer a somewhat controlled ink film thickness across the ink train to the s... More - How do gearless presses work, and what are their advantages?
Steve Utschig, Consulting Technical Editor, 01/01/2002
Flexography is increasingly becoming the print method of choice for a wide variety of applications. The choice to choose flexographic printing is only partly made because of its economical advantages. What really drives the selection of flexo as a process is the constantly improving quality and consistency. More - How can we speed up press changeovers?
Steve Utschig, 11/01/2001
As everyone is aware in this industry, print jobs being requested today are not only becoming more complex, but shorter in duration at the press. This means the printer must not only have a handle on print capabilities, but also successfully manage the press cleaning and changeover process for maximum efficiency. More - How can more consistency be built into a press operation?
Steve Utschig, Consulting Technical Editor, 07/01/2001
Consistency in press operations requires a more concentrated effort from the press operators in understanding the theory of the process and following the same procedures each time they set up and run their respective presses. This can be effectively accomplished by the development of a checklist of the steps to follow and should be generated by the press operators and supervisory personnel ... More - Can teamwork boost process printing quality?
Steve Utschig, Consulting Technical Editor 920/735-4882, 05/01/2001
utschig@foxvalleytech.com The customers we serve are demanding higher quality printing and graphics on our materials today because of the market trends toward process printing on all forms of flexible packaging, as well as on cartons. In order for higher quality to become reality, there has to be a coordinated effort from all parties involved to understand the flexo process and what is requir... More
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