Printing machines can be divided into several categories, including:

• Screen printing presses (rotary or flat)
• Offset Printers
• Digital Inkjet Printers
• Laser Printers
• Pad Printing Machines
• Flexographic rotogravure or flexo presses
• Packaging Printing Equipment
• Laser cutting machines

In the article “Technologies transforming the print and publishing sectors”, we discussed the evolution of the printing press, covering how the printing sector has been through many developmental stages this century. This article will delve further into the application of different printing machines.

Screen Printing Machines

Screen printing is a printing technique that uses a metal mesh to transfer ink onto paper. The mesh is stretched over a frame that holds the ink and paper, with the screen covering both. It can be moved up and down to create different patterns, producing an image on clothing.

Screen printing is one the most effective ways to make t-shirts in bulk and work with various graphics.

The equipment used in screen printing has changed drastically over time as technology has improved. However, there are still many parts that remain consistent throughout different styles of printing:

• A squeegee – Used to force ink through the screen onto the paper by pulling it across the surface
• A print plate – A piece of plastic coated in emulsion (a substance used in photography) which allows you to see what your final design will look like before printing begins

The advantage of screen printing is that the surface of the recipient does not have to be flat and that the ink can adhere to a wide range of materials, such as paper, textiles, glass, ceramics, wood, and metal.

Offset Printing

Traditional offset printing is a print method that uses aluminium plates to transfer ink onto a rubber sheet (often referred to as a “blanket”). The image is then rolled onto the printing surface. This printing method is considered “offset” because the ink is not transferred to the paper directly.

This method is generally considered the best option when printing large quantities. Although there is a high initial cost to set up the equipment, additional units become relatively less expensive as quantity increases.

Offset printing allows for a wide range of print materials to be used during production.

It allows the printer to use different paper types, custom finishes, and a wide variety of inks. The high-quality images produced through offset printing make it the preferred method, especially among graphic designers, when seeking the most excellent colour reproduction, detail, and professional-looking prints. (Source: The InkTank)

An example of equipment, sheetfed offset printing machinery, can be used for commercial applications such as brochures, envelopes and flyers.

Digital Inkjet Printing

For digital inkjet printing, ink is transferred directly onto the surface. Rather than relying on aluminium plates and rubber blankets to transfer an image, digital printing uses liquid ink during production. Traditional home inkjet printers are one of the most common digital printing methods.

Digital printing requires no manual setup. It’s highly effective for use with smaller quantity runs. It is far more cost-effective than offset printing for low-volume projects.

Because of the lack of setup, digital printing is also a quick process, capable of completing projects on short notice or finishing a job to meet tight deadlines. Digital printing also offers maximum customisation. Each piece can be customised, making this method extremely effective if a job needs personalised customer names.

Digital printing is a type of printing that uses a digital printer and computer to print directly from your design file. Digital printing machines use an inkjet or laser to print high-quality graphics and can be used for short-run jobs.

AKINGATE Printing Technology 2

Laser Printers

Laser printers are one of the most commonly found on the market and can be used for various jobs.

The laser used in these machines can move very quickly to “write” with much greater speed than an inkjet printer.

If your business focuses on printing flyers, brochures, or other materials that require illustrations to be printed, then laser printers may be the best choice for you.

Laser printers provide speed, precision, and economy and are an excellent choice for many projects.

Pad Printing Machines

Also called tampography or tampo printing, it is an indirect offset (gravure) printing process where a silicon pad takes a 2-D image from a laser engraved (etched) printing plate (also called cliché) and transfers it to a 3-D object. Thanks to pad printing, it is now possible to print all kinds of complex-shaped products, such as curved (convex), hollow (concave), cylindrical, spherical, compound angles, textures, etc., which were not available with traditional printing processes. (Source: Printing International)

Pad printing machines are used in the manufacturing of short-run or customised products. They’re also used for small batches of goods, as well as for mass production. These machines print patterns on various materials such as plastic, glass and metal.

The pad printer operates by applying ink to a substrate with a pad pressed against this surface. There are different pad printers based on their printing mechanism: rotary or reciprocating (side-to-side) motion; electrostatic; hot stamping; laser transfer, or thermal rollers.

Pad printing is used for printing complex products in many industries, such as:

• The pharmaceutical sector for printing on coated tablets and gel capsules
• The medical sector for printing on components of medical devices such as syringes, inhalers, insulin pens, catheters, etc.
• The candy industry where coated sweets and chewing gums are printed.
• Sporting goods
• The cosmetics industry for decorating perfume bottles, lipstick holder, etc.
• Beverage packaging for printing on bottle caps, corks, etc.

Flexo Printing Machines

Flexo printing is a type of printing that uses a flexographic printing press. Flexographic printing typically utilises an elastomer or polymer image carrier such as sleeves, cylinders, and plates. The image carrier is engraved or imaged to create the design for the final desired product. Ink is transferred from the ink pan via an anilox roll onto the image carrier, which is then printed onto the substrate.

Flexo printing is most commonly associated with uses in flexible packaging, labels, and other products, utilising a variety of substrates, including film, paper, foil, and non-woven. Flexo is used for full-colour or black-and-white print jobs.

Flexographic printing can be very cost-effective when printing large runs with basic needs. With proper maintenance and storage and investment in durable image carrier materials, flexo image carriers can be reused many times before they need to be replaced.

Flexo can print on porous and non-porous surfaces, making it ideal for various substrates, including coated linerboard and paper. (Source: Luminite blog)

Packaging Printing Equipment

Packaging printing equipment is the most common type of packaging printing equipment. It is used to print on packaging, and the types of packaging printed utilising this kind of equipment are very diverse. Packaging printing equipment comprises many parts, but the two main parts are an automatic feeding system and a take-up reel device, which moves with the help of a motor or other sources.

Packaging printings usually use inkjet technology because it does not require coating or lamination, unlike screen printing and embossing methods. The materials used for this process include paperboard, plastics such as PVC and PETG sheets (polyethene terephthalate), woven fabrics such as nylon twill cloths or leathers; alloys such as aluminium foils; metals like tinned steel panels; glass bottles made from any kind including soda bottles etc., all which depend on what type you need to be printed on them so you can choose which one suits your needs best!

Laser cutting machines

A laser cutter can use two techniques- laser cutting and engraving. Laser cutting utilises a high-powered laser to cut the material into various shapes, whereas a laser engraver can engrave a piece with a design. You can laser cut multiple materials such as acrylic, MDF, plywood, cardboard, & POM. Generally, laser cutters are more intuitive and easier to use than 3D printers because they’re a contained system. Cutting a flat piece into segments or a design is easier to program and construct than building a three-dimensional object from the ground up.

Laser cutting can be used to cut out and create intricate designs with a perfection that is impossible to create with free-hand cutting. Due to the intuitive nature of the machine, people have used laser cutting for various projects, from creating artistic clocks to attaching logos to travel mugs to even putting engravings onto food like pies. (source: Invention Land Education)

Conclusion

Printing machines are a vital part of the printing process. They help ensure that your documents, material or products look beautiful and professional, no matter what material you use or how many copies you need to print out.

Depending on your business needs and budget, you may want to use more than one type of machine for maximum efficiency. Some businesses opt for a combination of different kinds of equipment so that they can produce multiple products from the same source material – this saves space as well as production time and money by enabling them to run more shifts per day without having to set up new plates every time they need a different product printed out!

 _____________________________________________________________

Copyright © Akingate. All Rights Reserved.

See our copyright notice.

Image Credit: bobst.com

The technologies that have transformed the print and publishing sectors come in various shades and cover the advancement in digital media, the internet, data transmission, storage, distribution and printing. These technologies have been developing over the years, decades and centuries, thanks to many studious tech-driven men and women. A summary of techs is discussed in this post.

Electronic Storage and the Internet

Data storage is integral to the print and publishing sectors. In the late 20th century, computers and related innovations such as the CD-ROM and the Internet allowed publishing to expand, making texts available online and on disk and fostering multimedia presentations and interactive uses.

 Data storage development has come a long way and covers punch cards, vacuum tubes for Random Access Memory, and magnetic disk storage (some may remember floppy disks). Research on optical discs led to CDs (Compact Discs), DVDs (Digital Video Recordings), and Blu-Ray. There is a portable storage device (flash drives) that plugs into computers via USB. We also have solid state drives that stores data on interlinked flash memory chips.

More recently, the internet has enabled the cloud data storage service, offering its user an unlimited amount of data storage and accessibility from anywhere, at any time. This service will play a vital role in digital publishing and printing. Encryption and authentication are related to technology due to security concerns. You can learn more from ‘A Brief History of Data Storage by Keith D. Foote (2017)’.

Printing Press Evolution

The printing sector has been through many developmental stages since the 6^th century, as summarised below.

1. Woodblock printing covered the use of wooden matrices that were engraved, inked and pressed onto a sheet of paper.
2. Movable-type printing: The centrepiece of his technique was the punch, a steel parallelepiped whose head was engraved in relief, and back to front, with a character: a number, letter or punctuation mark.
3. The rotary press: The system was initially hand-fed with single sheets and later fed by a paper roll: the images to be printed were curved around rotating cylinders. Becoming the first press suitable for large print runs.
4. Offset printing: An indirect method based on a simple chemical phenomenon (the repulsion between oil and water). Benefits include very sharp, clean images and high-quality printing on any paper.
5. The Linotype machine: A typesetting machine composes lines of text by pressing keys on a keyboard like a typewriter. Thomas Edison called the linotype machine “the eighth wonder of the world”.
6. The laser printer: The content to be printed is generated by electronic processes and printed directly onto the sheet of paper. Thereby optimising print speed, quantity per minute and accessibility to individuals and households.
7. 3D printing: A method that allows the creation of solid objects from 3D model software, e.g. AutoCAD, by adding overlapping layers of a photosensitive liquid polymer struck by UV light.
8. Various 3D printing technologies now exist distinguished by the type of layer assembly, e.g. use materials that are melted by heat and liquid materials that are hardened or laminated and bound together.

To learn more about the history of printing tech, refer to ‘A brief history of printing. From the 15th century to today, by Pixar Printing Blog (2018).’

Digital publishing

With tech advances in the book industry, not only are digital books, often known as e-books, increasingly popular but so are audiobooks. It is predicted the most significant source of revenue will come from e-books, followed by online newspapers and magazines. In 2012, Amazon began selling more digital books than physical ones. The print has given way to digital, and the publishing industry’s future is online.

E-books

The e-book combines the storage, search capabilities, and adaptability of a computer with the simulated page format of a traditional book. By 2000, thousands of books were being digitised, to be read online, downloaded, printed out by the reader, or printed on demand by the publisher. Digital books led to innovations in software for reading e-books on computers, and electronic tablets, which can store hundreds of publications and smartphones. E-books have contributed to the ease of self-publishing and distribution of indie books for download.

Audio-books

According to Statista, although printed books remain the most favourable option for consumers, audiobooks and e-books are now gaining ground. Both are predicted to see a promising CAGR in the next few years. Audiobooks are the fastest growing segment of the publishing industry, and estimates from analysts suggest that the global audiobook market could be worth more than ten billion U.S. dollars within the next five to ten years.

Print-on-demand

By the beginning of the 21st century, several independent online print-on-demand (or publish-on-demand) web companies had been created. An individual can print and bind a book on-demand in a retail store with the appropriate equipment in a few minutes.

Blockchain

IBM defines blockchain as a shared, immutable ledger that facilitates the process of recording transactions and tracking assets in a business network. Publishing and copyrights management could or are already benefiting from this technology; here are some examples:

• The easy access to and copying of electronically published material raised copyright issues. This leads to the need for publishers and authors to protect their copyright. Blockchain can protect authors’ copyright through a system that recognises the writer’s work so the authorship can be managed and ensures that the original creators get the credits and compensation for their work.
• Managing publishing and copyrights agreement between the publisher and author. Provision of a smart contract that an author can sign electronically.
• The wide availability of computer-driven desktop-publishing technology to small presses and individuals gave impetus to producing many self-published books. Blockchain can facilitate content distribution, monetisation and micropayment for self-publishers with transparency and avoiding third parties.
• Blockchain application to manage the protection, distribution and monetisation of millions of journals published globally.

Further credit: Article about Publishing industry by The Free Dictionary Encyclopedia (2020)

 _____________________________________________________________

Copyright © Akingate. All Rights Reserved.

See our copyright notice.

Image Credit: Polygraphy vector created by macrovector – www.freepik.com

We are on a journey and this post is a humble beginning. We are super excited about the future, more so about what this site is all about – technology, innovation, inventions and all that good stuff!.

Technology made large populations possible; large populations now make technology indispensable. – Joseph Krutch (Writer)

There are lots of untapped innovation waiting to be discovered and put to good use. Our vision at Akingate is to explore how existing or emerging technologies can result in tangible improvement to the quality of everyday lives.

We blog about tech development and creativity that’s making a difference in the lives of people or transforming industrial sectors. From the very simple innovations to complex inventions, count us in, we are interested.

Come along, enjoy the blog, learn and grow.

Please share your view on technological development and innovation in Nigeria or worldwide.

To submit a guest post email admin@akingate.com

To collaborate/work with us, please email a proposal to: tech@akingate.com

 

AKINGATE … imagination and creativity

#Innovation #Technology #Software #ideas #imagination invention #creativity #Fintech