+31 40 8080 193Make your own clichés with the cliché laser for pad printing
MetaQuip has developed a cliché laser machine with which a cliché can be made suitable for pad printing in a few minutes.
Make your own cliches
Advantages of laser printing cliches directly for pad printing:
- Time savings
- Flexibility
- Cost reduction
- Clean process: good for the environment
Tampon printing technique
Tampon printing is a technique that allows a wide variety of surfaces, such as flat, cylindrical, spherical, composite angles, textures, concave or convex surfaces, to be printed. In a flat slab (cliché) floors are made. These floors are filled with ink, which absorbs this ink by a smooth and elastic stamp of silicone rubber. The ink is then transferred by the tampon to the object to be printed.
This development is in conjunction with Tampo Technology The Netherlands BV (TTN) established.
Applications
Pad printing is used for printing prints on hard-to-print products. It is used in many industries such as medical sector, automotive, promotion branch, clothing, electronic items / equipment, sports equipment and toys.
Make your own clichés with a cliche laser
The clichés are an essential part of the process of tampon printing. The traditional technique for making clichés works with a UV exposure unit and uses photo exposure with film positives and chemical etching of a photopolymer plate. There are many disadvantages to this way of working:
- Labor intensive
- Slow
- Use harmful chemicals
- Often outsourced which takes extra time
All in all, therefore, a costly and dirty way of working. This is offset by the so-called “computer to plate” technique. This requires laser engraving involving laser etching of a specialized printing plate.
Innovation
In close collaboration with Tampo Techniek Nederland BV, MetaQuip has developed a fiber laser that is suitable for the direct engraving of a cliche plate. With this technique it is possible to create clichés with high quality, fast, flexible and cheap.
TTN the application expert
TTN has supplied the specially developed cliché material, material which, unlike other solutions, consists entirely of metal, which guarantees a long lifetime of the cliché. In addition, TTN has contributed its knowledge in the area of tampo printing: performing pressure testing and giving direction to the MetaQuip team based on clear feedback.
MetaQuip laser expert
MetaQuip has optimized the entire laser process and adapted it to the fiber laser machine, so that clichés can be made that have a constant pressure quality. Extensive process research was done for this with a large number of materials, graphical preprocessing and process settings. In the end, the perfect combination has come out with which it is possible to make consistent cliches that are immediately usable for tampon printing.
Collaboration
This innovation has led to a collaboration between TTN and MetaQuip to bring this product solution together to the market, where MetaQuip supplies the laser machines and TTN the cliches.
More information
Ideas for new applications or innovation?
Looking for a solution to a specific problem? Idea for a specific application for this innovation?
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