The textile industry, as the world’s third largest water-consuming industry, has the highest score in all industries, not less than 20%, in terms of water pollution. Considering that colored fabrics are dyed, white fabrics are bleached, printed textiles need to be steamed and dried to fix, and then remove excess ink, which should not be a surprise.

When turning to digital textile printing – by investing in dye sublimation and paper transfer technology – printing companies immediately experienced a significant reduction in water and energy use. The digital printing process saves at least 60% of the water consumption compared to the traditional six-color printing process. If all the running rice of all printed textiles in the world shifts from traditional printing to digital printing, we can save up to 760 billion liters of water, which means enough water can fill 300,000 Olympic swimming pools. And that’s not all. It can also save up to 800 million cubic meters of natural gas and 1,000 kilowatt hours of electricity.

Not only does digital printing require less resources, water and energy than conventional textile printing, even at a higher printing quality, but it also enables on-demand production – a key benefit for the fashion industry. No more worries about small batches or personalised variations. As a designer, this frees your creativity, and as a manufacturer, it lets you print just what you need, when you need it. Digital production shortens time-to-market and reduces business risk, but by digitally printing near their buyers, they also greatly reduce the cost of transportation too. Right now, up to 60% of all traditional textile production happens in Asia. With digital printing on the rise, a geographical shift is to be expected.

Addressing the environmental challenge
The adoption of digital printing technology is steadily growing. This should not come as a surprise, given all the benefits it brings. As mentioned above, digital textile printing helps produce more efficiently while reducing the environmental impact. In addition, the development of advanced eco-friendly inks is further boosting sustainability in the textile industry.
We strive to educate our clients on our sustainability initiatives and on how our products can help them reduce their own environmental impacts. This is a way, we believe, that we can all work together to protect this fragile planet.

The easy answer is that dyes are soluble, while pigments are insoluble. So much for easy answers! When we scratch beneath the surface, differences between these two classes of colorants are much more complex.

Pigments and dyes also differ in chemical composition and particle size, lightfastness and longevity, heat and chemical resistance, as well as range of product offerings and color gamut. These characteristics should be important to sign maker, screen printers and digital printers as well as to the serious artist, because it affects image reproduction and product durability.

To make paint, such as the paint used in the sign industry or artist’s oil paints or a pigment ink used in wide-format printers, the pigment powder is mixed with a resin or binding medium. The solid particles never dissolve. Instead, the particles are dispersed and suspended in their resin.

While the particles of pigments and the particles of resin are physically mixed together, there is no chemical combination. This suspension or mixture is referred to as a colloid. Technically speaking, the particles of pigment are so small that they remain suspended in the mixture do not settle to the bottom. In the real world, always mix your sign paints before use.

Main differences between Dye-based ink and pigment ink:

Pigments are generally classified into two broad categories: inorganic and organic. In comparing the two groups of pigments we can make the following generalizations:

Inorganic pigments are generally more opaque, providing greater hiding power than organic pigments.
Organic pigments are usually brighter than inorganic pigments.
Inorganic pigments are generally more fade resistant and chemical resistant than organic pigments.
Listed below are several characteristics which distinguish pigments from dyes:

Insoluble in water and most solvents. Particulate structure is generally unaltered when combined in ink and paint formulations. Rather than dissolving, the particulates remain in suspension in the liquid vehicle.

Fewer available pigments compared to the much wider range of dyes available. In part, this results because dyes are in greater demand, being used widely in fabric decoration, food coloring and cosmetics, as well as having applications in the paint and printing fields.

Limited color gamut compared to dyes. Traditionally, pigments produce less vibrant colors. However, today’s digital printers, which feature expanded ink sets of six or more colors, produce vivid color reproduction which rivals dye-based digital inks. The advantage is that printing today can be as beautiful as it is durable.

Typically, pigments are also more lightfast than dyes, especially when subjected to the extremes of an outdoor environment. Exterior applications subject colorants to more intense UV light combined with elevated temperatures, humidity, and air pollution.

Significantly larger particle size than dye molecules. The larger size of pigment particles may provide better durability, yet may present clogging problems in digital printing.

Adhesion to the substrate requires a binder or adherent. By comparison, dyes often are absorbed by the substrate, such as paper or wood, and often will adhere without any type of binder.

Digital printing technology is a general term for inkjet printing technology, which is more widely used in the textile industry than traditional printing and dyeing technology. With the increasingly diversified development trend of customers, the fabric of grey fabrics or garment printing has developed from large-scale production to small-volume, multi-variety and individualization. The digital printing technology not only has high-quality printing effect, but also meets the needs of customers for small batches and personalized printing. The flexible printing and dyeing enterprises can continue to develop in the fierce market competition.

As an emerging printing method, digital printing technology has satisfied the market’s increasingly diverse mid-to-high end demand and increased the diversity of the textile printing and dyeing industry by virtue of its high efficiency, low proofing cost, good printing effect and less pollution.

Today, environmental protection policies are becoming more and more stringent, and the traditional printing and dyeing industry is suffering. According to the statistics of relevant departments, the daily discharge of printing and dyeing wastewater in China is 3 million to 4 million cubic meters, accounting for 35% of the total discharge of industrial waste water in the country. The traditional printing and dyeing industry has become the key controlled object of national energy conservation and emission reduction, and its environmental pollution has already restricted The industry is sustainable. In contrast, about 30% of the dyes in traditional printing can’t be combined with fiber, and a lot of sewage is produced after washing. The digital printing technology is more energy-saving. The dye consumption is only 40% of the traditional process, only 5% of the floating color, the amount of sewage is only For the traditional process of 1 / 15 ~ 1 / 25, the comprehensive energy consumption is only 1/3 ~ 1/4 of the traditional. It can be seen that the economic and social benefits brought by digital printing will have a major impact on China’s textile printing and dyeing industry.

However, digital printing does not completely replace traditional printing and dyeing. Digital printing has also been developed in China for 20 years. Although the country has always reiterated the elimination of backward production capacity, it is difficult to replace it with digital printing. There are two main reasons. First, the cost advantage of small batch production greatly exceeds that of traditional printing. However, because the ink price is relatively expensive compared to traditional printing, the mass production is higher than the traditional production. Second, the traditional printing It is a spot color printing, that is, the color of each set of color paste is accurate, and the color of digital printing is a mixture of CMYK four-color ink, the difference of ink, the difference between printing nozzles, and the small changes in the environment during printing. Will affect the accuracy of the mixed colors.

In textile printing, although digital printing technology still has many unachievable effects compared with traditional printing and dyeing digital technology, it is undeniable that digital printing technology is changing the production mode of printing products with its unique technical advantages. More and more used in soft sign advertising. The advantages of digital printing technology are shown in the following points:

1. Bright colors, clear patterns and high printing accuracy
2. Short period, fast response, no plate making, flexible batch, no pattern limitation, and the image can be modified arbitrarily, regardless of proofing, small batch, large batch production, fast delivery.
3. Environmental protection, no pollution, low energy consumption, low pollution, low noise, no waste water generated during the whole printing process, low noise, is a true pollution-free production technology.
4. Suitable for personalization, digital inkjet printing covers a small area, can be printed in the office and home, can achieve personalized digital printing through the Internet.

For first time sublimation printers, it is sometimes a challenge to convince them of the benefits of using a third-party RIP software product like Wasatch Softrip or Ergosoft PosterPrint, versus the standard printer driver packaged with their printer.

Why do I need a RIP?
Some large format printers provide some sort of printer driver or rudimentary onboard RIP to convert image file data into a form that your printer can understand. However, most users need more than this in order to achieve anything close to optimal results from their printer. The advantages of a professional RIP fall into two categories: Color and Workflow.

Will a RIP really make your colors brighter and improve your image quality? Is it really necessary to run your printer with a RIP? Can’t you achieve the same results simply by using the included print driver?

In commercial printing environments, an efficient production line is critical to meeting output goals, saving money and time. There are several features that RIP software offers that can streamline your operations including the ability to intelligently arrange images on the page to save paper, file preparation, managing print job order in the queue, and printing in a networked environment. The native drivers included with your inkjet printer typically only supports basic features. And often times, even those basic features can be difficult or cumbersome to use. Furthermore, wide format printers often find that the native drivers do not cut it when it comes to speed, accurate image reproduction and image quality. The bottom line is that printer manufacturers are in the business of manufacturing printers and selling consumables for the printers – they are not in the software business for RIPs.

In contrast, third party RIP software is specifically designed to help users streamline production in the toughest of production environments. Detailed below is a profile of some of the advantages of Wasatch SoftRip RIP Software.

Wasatch SoftRIP optimizes the performance of virtually every large format device available today, in terms of color reproduction, throughput speeds, and workflow efficiency. Wasatch SoftRIP provides interactive previews, control of image size and cropping, color correction, and unmatched control of ICC profiles throughout the entire color workflow. No matter how large or complex your production environment, SoftRIP has the automation tools you need for complete control.

Wasatch SoftRIP is easy and intuitive

New users can start printing immediately with fast setup and plug-and-play simplicity. Advanced features are easily accessed through master screens and are intuitive so you can learn and use them easily.

Wasatch SoftRIP helps you reach your color goals

Anyone can achieve accurate color with SoftRIP. With 16-bit color rendering and our exclusive Precision Stochastic Screens halftone method, Wasatch achieves excellent color reproduction with perfectly smooth gradients.

Las impresoras Epson son populares en la industria de la impresión debido a su alto rendimiento. Un ejemplo común del cabezal de impresión EPSON es el cabezal de impresión EPSON DX5. Este cabezal de impresión permite mayor velocidad y resoluciones de alta velocidad de impresión con sus tintas eco solventes. Los cabezales de impresión solventes DX5 Eco utilizan tinta de alta calidad para garantizar una impresión de alta calidad.
Con el tiempo, la Epson DX5 ha sido el tipo más utilizado para impresoras de gran formato, especialmente funciona mejor en impresoras UV. Pero eso no significa que, en lo que respecta a la compra del cabezal de impresión Epson DX5, no haya ningún problema. Porque hay cabezales Epson DX5 bloqueados y desbloqueados existentes en el mercado. Y los desbloqueados se dividen en 1er encriptado y 2do encriptado.

¿Por qué bloquear el cabezal de impresión Epson DX5?
En el año de 2012, para proteger las ventas de impresoras de Epson, Epson agregó un código de cifrado en la placa de memoria DX5 para evitar que las marcas y modelos de impresoras nacionales lo usen. Pero los cabezales de impresión bloqueados causan errores de impresión con frecuencia y no se imprimen en absoluto. Aún así, estos cabezales de impresión inutilizables son vendidos por fabricantes sin escrúpulos en el mercado.

Cabezal de impresión Epson DX5 desbloqueado
Varios meses después, un ingeniero emprendedor desarrolló una tarjeta de memoria que eliminó el código y desbloqueó el cabezal de impresión, haciéndolo utilizable nuevamente. Se refieren a ellos como cabezas “bloqueadas por primera vez”.
Sin embargo, Epson encontró formas de bloquear el cabezal de impresión Epson DX5 nuevamente, y eso es “segunda vez bloqueado”. Esa es la razón de los cabezales de impresión DX5 bloqueados y desbloqueados en el mercado.

Saber cuál es el cabezal de impresión correcto
Comprar un cabezal de impresión bloqueado puede ser un error costoso, entonces, ¿cómo podemos identificar la DX5 bloqueada y desbloqueada?
Hay una manera fácil de detectar DX5 desbloqueado al comprar, que es a través del diseño del conector para el cabezal de impresión.

Un cabezal de impresión bloqueado tiene contactos en cada borde, mientras que el desbloqueado tiene contactos en el medio.
La brecha entre ellos también es diferente.

In English, “pass” means “passing”. Will “pass” in the printing device be straightforward?! It can be said here, no. In the printing industry, “pass” refers to the number of times the screen needs to be printed (the number of masks per unit area). The higher the PASS number, the slower the printing speed, and the better the relative quality. Otherwise, the uv printer is usually used. In inkjet printing equipment, 6pass and 4pass printing are more common. For example, if you play a 4PASS map, each pixel needs to be divided into 4 masks to print. Usually, adding PASS number can improve the picture quality. PASS means that the printout is completed when printing. The inkjet is a line printing method, 4PASS is 4 times printing, and so on.

A few passes of inkjet is required to complete the print area. Different stacking points for different pass points will be different, and the colors will be different. PASS usually has controllable options on the relevant uv printer and printer control software. For example, the RIP printing software of the uv printer can print the PASS according to the needs of the user. Output a perfect picture effect. The PASS number is related to the printing accuracy, and the difference in the printing accuracy PASS number is different.

How to solve the phenomenon of pass channel drawing in uv inkjet printer?

The difference is the PASS road, or the disconnection. If you don’t understand these two concepts, there is no way to provide assistance. When you say the PASS channel, please stop printing immediately, and then print the test strip directly. If it is broken, look at the broken colors. If the broken color is the color of the margin part of the nozzle, you can think about it. The pump composition does not match print head, and the orientation of the two can be adjusted according to the specific situation. If the ink-breaking method is used in the middle of the nozzle, the pipeline should be considered, especially if the ink capsule is used for a long time. maybe the ink sac and the nozzle’s socket are not tight enough, there is a leaky scene? Maybe your ink may be of poor quality (some inks are not very fluid and will break the ink)

You cannot do a DTG print on polyester?
The truth is that some polyester is printable and the future is bright.

Yes, DTG printing is best suited for 100% cotton and blends with high cotton content. But, successfully embellishing white polyester garments on a DTG printer has been done for quite some time. It’s as simple as applying polyester pretreatment and decorating with a CMYK image. The result looks like a sublimation print.

Color garments have been more of a challenge, but not impossible. Dye migration can occur at a DTG print’s common curing temperature. This happens when the polyester fabric’s dye is released into the ink. White ink on a red shirt will result in a pink image. Screen printers have resolved this issue with low-cure-temperature inks.

With DTG — just as with cotton garments — some dark-polyester products print better than others. Printing a dark-polyester garment requires applying a light coat of polyester pretreatment, drying and repeating. The shirt can then be printed like normal. After printing, it should be heat set at 265˚F for 45 seconds, cooled and cured twice. This technique may vary with specific garments and ink systems, so experimentation is mandatory.

This multistep process is a bit tedious, but it tells us that polyester printing with a DTG printing machine is not only possible, but also is being done today. The process will become simpler and more commonplace in the near future.