In addition to inkjet inks, often CMYK enhanced by white and other special colours, the Actega Terra inkjet R & D-team has developed an overprint varnish that can be applied to pre-printed surfaces, using the Seiko 1536 RC print head. This combination is applied in the modular print bar-arrangement "HIVE" from ideeGo GmbH. The compact aNIR® drying-module from adphos evaporates the water from the ink with maximum efficiency.

This concept is ideally suited as the final stage of print finishing. The inkjet printhead 1536RC from Seiko enables the variable wetting of the pre-printed substrate with the varnish from Actega Terra. Due to the high energy efficiency of the adphos aNIR® technology, the liquid can evaporate from the water-based varnish in a very small space. Depending on the printing speed and application quantity, only a few centimetres of drying distance are necessary.

Inkjet inks must meet certain viscosity requirements to be compatible with the printheads. The subsequent high-water content of the inks requires a high input of energy for evaporation in order to obtain a well-dried ink film on the substrate. In the packaging industry in particular, often substrates are used that deform or unintentionally change colour under heat. adphos aNIR® copes with this challenge due to low absorption of the NIR-irradiation in the substrate.

adphos aNIR® stands for advanced NearInfraRed. In the modules from adphos, a sophisticated flow of warm air is combined with the specific properties of NIR energy sources. The highest energy density, up to 1.5 MW per square meter, can be achieved in the NIR wavelength-spectrum.

In addition to energy efficiency and the small footprint, aNIR® enables CO2-free drying, lower energy consumption, no downtime for preheating and no energy consumption when changing jobs. These properties of adphos aNIR® solutions enable an ROI within a few months. This high-performance solution can be integrated into existing or new printing solutions as a booster or as a sole drying solution to optimize existing printing systems and enables a considerable increase in productivity with a comparatively low investment.

A video of the application can be streamed on the Seiko Printek virtual.drupa-presence. The four co-operating companies involved will present this concept in a panel discussion on Thursday, April 22nd, 2021 at 1:20 p.m. as part of virtual.drupa. The transmission can be followed at the following link:

https://events.drupa.de/de/veranstaltung/analog-to-digital-inkjet-printing-of-aqueous-varnish 

Further information about the partners involved can be found under the following links:
www.adphos.com 
www.seiko-instruments.de/products/inkjet-print-heads.html  
https://www.actega.com/de/de/ 
www.ideegoonline.de