www.fibre2fashion.

com

Technological Advances
in Rotary & Flatbed
Printing (Part 1)

By:
Pavan S. Chinta
& Prof. S. K. Laga
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Technological Advances in Rotary and Flatbed Printing

(Part 1)
By: Pavan S. Chinta & Prof. S. K. Laga
Introduction:
Textile printing is an extensive industry and having a history of about 2000 years. But
intensive developments activity both from technological advancement and machinery
developments in printing took place in last decade only to meet present days highly
fashion oriented demands. Over the years various developments from the point of
technology with respect to styles of printing, methods of printing and print paste were
going on.
Today, 5% of all fabrics produced as white and 70-75% are dyed. 5% is woven from dyed
yarns and rest 20% is printed. In industrialized countries, 49% of all printed goods are
used for apparel, 37% for home textiles, and 9% to make other articles like umbrellas,
linings and camping materials, 4% as a carpet and 1 % for technical textiles.
Screen-printing is arguably the most versatile of all printing processes. It can be used to
print on a wide variety of substrates including paper, paperboard, plastics, glass, metals,
fabrics and many other materials including paper, plastic, glass, metal, nylon and
cotton. Some common products from the screen-printing industry include posters,
labels, decals, signage and all types of textiles and electronic circuit boards. The
advantage of screen-printing over other print processes is that the press can print on
substrates of any shape, thickness and size. A significant characteristic of screen-
printing is that a greater thickness of the ink can be applied to the substrate than is
possible with other printing techniques.
This allows for some very interesting effects that are not possible using other printing
methods. Because of the simplicity of the application process, a wider range of inks and
dyes are available for use in screen-printing than for use in any other printing process.
Table No.1: Relative Contribution of Printing Methods Utilization of screen
Printing printing presses has
1978 1982 1986 1990 2001 begun to increase
methods
Table Ptg. 3 2 2 2 1 because production
Transfer 5 6 6 6 6 rates have improved.
Flatbed 18 17 18 18 20 This has been a result
Roller 32 27 22 16 1 of the development of
Rotary 42 48 52 59 72 the automated and
rotary screen printing
press, improved dryers, and U. V. curable ink. The major chemicals used include screen,
emulsions, inks, and solvents, surfactants, caustics and oxidizers used in screen
reclamation. The inks used vary dramatically in their formulations [1].
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Historical Development
The techniques of stencil printing initially used simple patterns on walls and for
lettering were developed into an intricate craft for fabric printing. In Japan, in the 17th
century idea of tying together parts of stencil with human hair initiated the
developments. Then in 1850 in Lyon, the first use of silk gauze as a supporting stencil
base was employed and the techniques soon becomes known as screen printing.
The use of hand screen-printings grew up in the period of 1930 to 1954 and was ideal for
growing quantities of man made fabrics. With the successful mechanization of flat
screen printing and ultimately the use of rotary screen machine copper roller printing
becomes the obsolete. In the 1990, the worldwide production from copper roller
printing was estimated to be only 16%of the total and 59% from the rotary screen
printing in the 1992 the share of share of rotary screen printing ~as grown up to
82.8%the machine which was introduced in the 1785 and roller printing which rules
industry more than 150 years disappeared. The relative contribution of printing
methods to the total world printed textile products (in %) is given in Table No.1.
Very fast developments have taken place in the printing technology during the last
decades with respect to machinery used for printing and production of prints and after
treatments of the printed textiles. In this paper development regarding the screen-
printing, in that flatbed and rotary method is discussed.
Screen Printing
Screen-printing consists of three elements: the screen which is the image carrier; the
squeegee; and ink. The screen-printing process uses a porous mesh stretched tightly
over a frame made of wood or metal. Proper tension is essential to accurate color
registration. The mesh is made of porous fabric or stainless steel mesh.
A stencil is produced on
the screen either
manually or photo
chemically. The stencil
defines the image to be
printed in other printing
technologies this would
be referred to as the
image plate.
Screen printing ink is
applied to the substrate
by placing the screen over
the material. Ink with a
paint-like consistency is placed onto the top of the screen. Ink is then forced through the
fine mesh openings using a squeegee that is drawn across the screen, applying pressure
thereby forcing the ink through the open areas of the screen. Ink will pass through only
in areas where no stencil is applied, thus forming an image on the printing substrate.
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The diameter of the threads and the thread count of the mesh will determine how much
ink is deposited onto the substrates. They are depicted in Figure No.1.
Many factors such as composition, size and form, angle, pressure and speed of the blade
(squeegee) determine the quality of the impression made by the squeegee. At one time
most blades were made from rubber, which, however, is prone to wear and edge nicks
and has a tendency to warp and distort. While blades continue to be made from rubbers
such as neoprene, most are now made from polyurethane, which can produce, as many
as 25,000 impressions without significant degradation of the image [2].
Rotary Screen Printing
Most people think of screen-printing as a flat printing process because the substrates are
usually flat and decorated in a horizontal position. Screen printing is also associated
with piece-decorating applications, in which individual sheets of substrate are printed
one by one, usually on semi and three-quarter-automatic flatbed presses that require
manual loading and/or unloading. When screen-printing is used as a piece-printing
process with manual material handling, screen shops sacrifice productivity. Businesses
that invest in automatic, multicolor, inline flatbed systems regain some of this
productivity by
eliminating manual
handling from all or
most of the sequence.
Yet throughput
continues to be limited
because every sheet of
substrate still must
pause at each printing
station to receive the
image.
The good news is that
you don't have to
sacrifice the benefits of
screen printing to overcome the limitations of flatbed printing technology. For many
applications requiring efficient, high volume, high-quality printing and rotary screen-
printing may be the answer.
What is Rotary Screen-Printing?
Rotary screen-printing is so named because it uses a cylindrical screen that rotates in a
fixed position rather than a flat screen that is raised and lowered over the same print
location. Rotary presses place the squeegee within the screen. These machines are
designed for roll-to-roll (web) printing on flexible materials ranging from narrow web
films to wide-format roll textiles.
In rotary printing1 the web travels at a consistent speed between the screen and a steel
or rubber impression roller immediately below the screen. (The impression roller serves
the same function as the press bed on a flatbed press.) As the web passes through the
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rotary unit, the screen spins at a rate that identically matches the speed of substrate
movement.
The squeegee on a rotary press is in a fixed position with its edge making contact with
the inside surface of the screen precisely at the point where the screen, substrate, and
impression roller come together.
Ink is automatically fed into the center of the screen and collects in a wedgeshaped
"well" formed by the leading side of the squeegee and the screen's interior surface. The
motion of the screen causes this bead of ink to roll, which forces ink into stencil
openings, essentially
flooding the screen
without requiring a
floodbar. The squeegee
then shears the ink as the
stencil and substrate come
into contact, allowing the
ink to transfer cleanly to
the material.
In short, rotary printing is
a continuous, step less
image-transfer method.
The geometry of the
screen and the position of
the squeegee within the
screen combine to provide
both the screen flooding
and image-transfer
functions in a single
smooth operation that repeats with every revolution of the screen.
Rotary vs. Flat Screen-Printing
The virtues of rotary screen-printing are most apparent when the process is compared to
traditional flat screen printing.
Productivity:
Among the biggest attractions of rotary screen-printing is its production speed. On a
rotary press, images are applied to the entire width of the substrate as the material
moves continuously through the printing mechanism-substrate size really has no impact
on press speed. The only factor that determines the production rate is the speed of
screen rotation/substrate movement (remember, these values are the same), which is
limited primarily by the type and rheology of the ink being used.
Because of the way rotary presses operate, their production rates are reported as linear
measurements and typically fall within a range of 100-450 tVmin (30-100 m/min),
depending on the model and the specific application. The situation is a little different
with flatbed presses. On a flatbed press, printing is a two-step process that involves a
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pass over the screen by the flood bar to fill mesh openings with ink, followed by a
squeegee pass to bring the stencil and substrate into contact for ink transfer. As
previously noted, the flooding and printing action on a rotary system is all part of the
same continuous motion, and separate strokes for these functions are not required. Not
only does this approach reduce printing times but it also removes the flood bar as a
variable from the printing process.
Furthermore, to maintain good edge definition and ensure registration accuracy on
multicolor prints, each sheet printed on a flatbed is held stationary (usually with
vacuum draw down from the press bed) during the print cycle. When you add the
separate flood and print strokes to the equation, it is clear that a flatbed's productivity is
influenced by substrate size because the larger the substrate, the greater the distance the
flood bar/ squeegee assembly must travel and the longer the time required for each
print cycle. If we look at manufacturer specifications for a range of common flatbed
presses and convert their quoted production rates into linear speeds, it's safe to say that
these machines will support a printing speed up to 35-50 ft/min (10-15 m/min).
Material handling:
Because rotary presses work with web-fed materials, they eliminate the need to feed
substrates into the press piece by piece, as is common with flatbed units. Users simply
thread the desired material into a rotary machine from a reel at one end, and the
machine continues to pull more material through as needed. The substrate may
continue through a drying unit after printing. Subsequently, it may be directed to a
rewinding unit or on to another printing or finishing operation configured inline with
the rotary press. With standalone flatbeds and multicolor in-line systems, getting the
printed sheets to other finishing areas usually requires more cumbersome and time-
consuming manual handling methods.
Off-contact and image integrity:
Off-contact distance between the screen and substrate during the print cycle is a critical
issue for those who use flatbed screen-printing equipment. It is a non-issue for those
who employ rotary presses. In flatbed printing, screens are usually made from polyester
mesh that has been stretched onto a frame. In order to achieve good printed edge
definition and detail, press operators leave a small gap between the stencil and the
substrate.
During the printing cycle, the squeegee closes this gap, bringing the screen and
substrate into contact by depressing the screen. The tension of the fabric causes it to
"snap off" the substrate immediately behind the moving squeegee, allowing the
transferred ink to retain the detail of the stencil. Without off contact, the screen would
tend to stick to the printed substrate and the image would be smeared or blurred. The
problem is that the process of depressing the screen to transfer the ink also stretches the
screen and the image it contains. This results in distortion to the printed image. The
closer that the squeegee is to the edges of the screen, the greater this distortion becomes.
This entire means is that some degree of image distortion always occurs with flatbed
screen-printing.
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In contrast, rotary screen-printing bypasses the whole off-contact/image-distortion

issue. This is because on rotary presses, the surface of the cylindrical screen just makes
contact with the web as it moves between the screen and the impression roller. Rotary-
press users as often refer to maintaining this line of contact "kiss printing." The off
contact in rotary printing is essentially zero because creating snap-off is unnecessary--
the rotation of the screen away from the print surface serves the same basic function [2].
Screen Materials and Preparation Overview
Screen Preparation:
Screen (or image transfer) preparation includes a number of steps. First the customer
provides the screen printer with objects, photographs, text, ideas, or concepts of what
they wish to haxe printed. The printer must then transfer a "picture" of the artwork (also
called "copy") to be printed into an "image" (a picture on film) which can then be
processed and eventually used to prepare the screen stencil. Once the artwork is
transferred to a positive image that will be chemically processed onto the screen fabric
(applying the emulsion or stencil) and eventually mounted onto a screen frame that is
then attached to the printing press and production begins [3].
Frames:
There are two types of screen frames, metal and wood. Metal frames, both static (solid)
and retentionable, have become the industry standard. Retentionables do not require
the use of adhesive products. Metal frames have been replaced by wood because they do
not warp from water like wood frames do. The most commonly used types of wood are
cedar and pine. Pine is preferred because it is more water resistant while it is
lightweight. Metal screens are made out of aluminum or steel. Aluminum is commonly
preferred because it is lightweight, yet sturdy. There are some applications - such as very
large printing frames used for long printing runs - where steel is preferred.
Fabric:
Screen making - there are two types of threads for screen fabric:
Monofilament - Single strands woven into fabric.
• Primarily used in commercial printing and other applications.
• Advantage: Monofilament is easier to clean than multifilament.
• Monofilament mesh has become the industry standard.
Multifilament - Multiple strands wound together like a rope, then woven into fabric.
• Primarily used in textile printing.
• Disadvantage: ink tends to build up on screen, more difficult to clean.
Fabric Types
Today commercial screen-printing primarily uses four types of fabric for making
screens. They are silk, cotton organdie, nylon, and polyester. Silk was the original
material used to make screens for screen printing. By far, the most widely used fabric is
monofilament polyester followed by multifilament polyester and nylon.
Silk - multifilament weave
∗ Looses tightness with frequent use
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∗ Reclaiming chemicals containing bleach or chlorinated solvents destroy the silk.

∗ Today silk is primarily used for printing art, not commercial use as before.
Cotton Organdie - multifilament weave
∗ Same disadvantages as silk. Nylon· multifilament/monofilament • Good for
stretching.
Nylon – multifilament/monofilament
∗ Good for stretching.
∗ Compared to polyester, lacks stability.
∗ Less rigid than polyester.
∗ Not suitable for closely registered colors.
Table 2 : Relative Contribution of Printing Methods
Advantages Disadvantages
Very intense colours can be printed with Print production speeds are relatively
very good covering power and opacity. slow.
Screen-printing can print onto almost any It is difficult to reproduce very fine
substrate and thickness. detail and small type.
It is possible to print onto curved, uneven Halftone reproduction requires coarse
and fragile surfaces. screen rulings.
High degrees of light fastness and durability Stencil making is a slow and labour
can be achieved (depending on ink system). intensive process.
It can print unusual ink formulations and Ink costs represent a considerable
Specialist coatings. portion of the job cost.

Polyester - multifilament or monofilament (calendared monofilament polyester,

metallized monofilament polyester)
∗ Primary material used in commercial screen printing.
∗ Polyester is strong and stable when stretched.
Other screen materials
∗ Carbonized polyester
∗ Glass
∗ Wire mesh
∗ Stainless steel
Screens made of the same material can differ in thread diameter, number of threads per
inch, and choice of mono- or multifilament fibers. The need for various characteristics
such as wearability and dimensional stability will help to determine the fabric selected
for a particular screen printing job. Diameter of mesh thread and number of threads per
inch determine the amount of ink transferred to the substrate during the printing
process [4].
Screen Mesh:
Screen mesh refers to the number of threads per inch of fabric. The more numerous the
threads per inch, the finer will be the screen. Finer mesh will deposit a thinner ink
deposit. This is a desirable affect when printing a very fine detail and halftones.
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Typically, a fabric should be 200-260 threads per inch. Water based inks work best on
finer mesh. These are generally used in graphic and industrial printing. Course mesh
will deposit a heavier ink deposit. This type of screen is used on flatter, open shapes.
Typically, a course screen mesh will be 160-180 threads per inch. These are generally
used in textile printing.
Emulsion/Stencils:
The words emulsion and stencil are used interchangeably in screen printing. Applying
the emulsion is the chemical process of transferring image to a screen. The function of
the emulsion (or stencil) is to cover the non-printing area of the screen. The stencil
process works due to the use of a light sensitive material that hardens when exposed to
ultraviolet light.
The stencil material must be of a material that is impermeable to the screen printing
ink. Materials used for stencils include plain paper, shellac or lacquer coated paper,
lacquer film, photographic film, and light-sensitive emulsions.
Stencil types available include: handcut film, photographic film, direct coating,
direct/indirect photostencil, and wet-dire~ photostencil. The stencil is composed of
either a liquid product that is poured onto the screen mesh or a film product. There are
two types of photographic film, presensitized and unsensitized, available for use in the
preparation of stencils. Presensitized film is ready to use as purchased, while
unsensitized film must first be treated with a photosensitization solution.
In preparing the stencil, the film is exposed to a positive film image in a vacuum frame.
It is then developed in a solution that renders the unexposed image areas soluble in
water. The soluble areas are removed and the remaining film is bonded to the screen
fabric. If the item was printed on a manual or automatic screen press the printed
product will be placed on a conveyor belt, which carries the item into the drying oven or
through the UV curing system. Rotary screen presses feed the material through the
drying or curing system automatically. Air-drying of certain inks, though rare in the
industry, is still sometimes utilized. The advantages & disadvantages of screen printing
are illustrated in Table 2.
Stages of Developments in Printing Technology
Hand or Semiautomatic Screen Printing
The practice of hand printing is now mainly restricted to colleges of arts, small scale
units and high fashion industry as it is a craft rather than productive method of printing.
Here printing is carried out on a flat solid table covered with layer of resilient felt and
washable blanket. Heat for drying the printed fabric may be provided either under the
blanket or hot air fan s above the table. When screen-printing is carried out by hand
alternate repeat s are normally printed along the full length of table and gaps are filled
in this allows time for print paste to penetrate the fabric and partially dry.
The manual process has been semiautomised by mounting a screen on a carriage and
driving the squeezee mechanically across the screen table length is about 20 -60
mtr/min hand or semiautomatic printing the colors are printed one after another with
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time for drying i.e. wet on dry printing. Hence sharper results than printing the colors in
more rapid succession i.e. wet on wet printing [5].
Fully Automatic Flat Screen- Printing
In order to increase the production of printing, all colors should be applied on screen
simultaneously. But flat screen are not suitable coloration units for truly continuous
process, and here color is applied through the screen when it is stationary. In this
machine, the entire screen for the design (one screen for each color) is placed on the top
of the long endless belt known as blanket. This machine on average has space for 16
colours. The width of the gap between the areas printed by any two adjacent screens
must be whole number of length way design repeat.
The fabric is gummed to the blanket at entry end and moves along with the blanket in an
intermittent fashion. One screen repeat distance at a time after printing, it is pulled off
and passes into dryer a soiled blanket is washed and dried during the return passage on
the underside of the machine.
The machine has the following key sections:
− Fabric feeding unit
− Gumming (adhesive system) unit
− Printing unit
− Drying units (printed fabric)
− Blanket washing and drying unit
The rate of screen-printing production was once dictated by the drying rate of the screen
print inks. Due to improvements and innovations the production rate has greatly
increased.
Some specific innovations, which have affected the production rate and also increased
screen press popularity, are:
1. Development of automatic presses versus hand operated presses which have
comparatively slow production times.
2. Improved drying systems which significantly improves production rate.
3. Development and improvement of U.V. curable ink technologies.
4. Development of the rotary screen press which allows continuous operation of the
press. This is one of the more recent technology developments [6].
General Developments
Adhesive System:
A water-based adhesive is applied to the blanket at the entry end with the help of set of
rollers by using tackey, semi permanent or permanent adhesive coating on the blanket.
This coating becomes tacky when heated and heat can be applied either directly to the
adhesive layer to the fabric.
Squeezee System:
Many factors such as composition, size and form, angle, pressure, and speed of the blade
(squeegee) determine the quality of the impression made by the squeegee. ,At one time
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most blades were made from rubber, which, however, is prone to wear and edge nicks
and has a tendency to warp and distort. While blades continue to be made from rubbers
such as neoprene, most are now made from polyurethane, which can produce, as many
as 25,000 impressions without significant degradation of the image. It may be either by
pair of parallel rubber blade squeezee magnetic rod squeegee.
Squeegee Modification:
With traditional squeegees, the effect of screen tension across the print width also is an
issue. The tensioned mesh creates additional resistance and deflection to the squeegee
toward the ends of the blade closest to the frame edges, as shown in the Figure No.4.
The variables
introduced by
squeegee pressure,
friction between the
squeegee and mesh,
and screen tension are
the basis for many of
the repeatability and
consistency problems
that plague the
screen-printing
process. To achieve
the higher print
speeds demanded, the
effects of friction and
applied pressure 'must
be made much less
significant in the
process.
Another undesirable
characteristic of
squeegee blades is
their tendency to
deflect as their ends
approach the frame,
resulting in non-
uniform ink-transfer
characteristics.
The best current
squeegees options for
increasing production
speeds are to use
squeegees that feature special support layers or use rigid back plates to prevent
deflection. These specialized blades and accessories tend to limit your latitude in setup,
but lead to more consistent and repeatable setups once you get used to them. The
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downside to these solutions is that the higher printing speeds they promote significantly
increase friction at the contact point, which can reduce the life of the screen and/or
squeegee.
When looking at the technologies used in other print processes, the obvious solution
that emerges is to replace the squeegee blade with a roller squeegee (Figure No.5). This
device allows greater speed to be achieved while maintaining an excellent and consistent
ink-film thickness. The roller squeegee is a concept that particularly suits web and
cylinder press formats, and it may even prove viable for flatbed presses.
It is proved that the rotary-squeegee concept worked, achieving 50% greater ink
deposits than a traditional squeegee. Research also showed that powering the squeegee's
rotation (rather than allowing it to rotate freely in response to screen motion) was the
best way to minimize the effects of frictional drag on ink transfer.
Roller-squeegee systems actually achieve twice the hydrodynamic force of the
conventional squeegee, and provide a controlled and highly supported contact region
and very little deflection. Such squeegees provide consistent contact across the width of
the image during printing. A limitation of the roller squeegee is that it requires a heavier
construction than the conventional squeegee blade, especially because it must be
independently driven to rotate. This also makes it more difficult to set up, which is why
its application in flatbed presses may be limited [7].
A promising solution to the limitations imposed by traditional squeegee blades is the
roller squeegee. It features a cylindrical frame surrounded by a compressible layer of
squeegee material. The squeegee is rotated during printing, rolling over the screen so
that friction forces are virtually eliminated. The-result is controlled and consistent ink
transfer.
Acknowledgement:
The authors wish to express their sincere thanks to Prof. (Dr.) P.V. Kadole, Principal
and Prof. (Dr.) S.K. Chinta, textile and Engineering Institute, Ichalkaranji, for their kind
cooperation and motivation to publish this paper.
References:
1. “Managing productivity in the apparel industry”, Rajesh Bheda, C.B.S. Publishers and
Distributers, New Delhi, India 1st Edition, 2003.
2. Stork, developments in the Textile Printing Industry, Boxmear Netherlands, Stork
Textile Printing Group, (2002).
3. "Printing making an impression", Holme I. AT J, March (1996); pp.58-60.
4. "An introduction in quality control for the apparel industry", Pradip V. Mehta, ASCC
Quality Press, Marcel Dekkar, Inc. 1992.
5. "Optimized Engraving Concepf', Christion Herbst and Martin Schabert, 1st issue
(2002), Vol.,48, pp. 58.
6. "Garment Printing: Todays Trend", Chattopadhyay D. and Kaur V., MMTI, (1996)
Aug, pp. 283-286.
7. "Diffusing Digital Ink Jet Printing as a Production Innovation in the Printed Textiles
Industry" ,T. F. Burgess1, S. M. Burkinshaw, and A. P. Vijayan, Textile Research
Journal, May (2003), pp. 41-46.
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8. "Textile printing by the ink jet process", Martin Klemm, I.T.B., July 2000, Vol. 46, 3rd
Issue, pp. 75.
9. Spruijt J, "The future textile printing", Journal of the Society of Dyers and Colourists
(1991),107, pp.75-76.
10. "Garment printing -Some novel effects", S K Laga, A I Wasif, Textile Asia , July (2007),
pp.2426.
11. "A Primer in Digital Textile Printing", Teri Ross, Imagine That, May 2001.
12. "Recent technological advancement in printing machinery", Prof. S.K. Chinta,
NCUTE, September 2001.

This article was originally published in the “New Cloth Market”, June,
2012.