Corrugated box printing how to grade

In the past, corrugated cartons had only been used as a storage and transportation package, and were therefore considered as a rough outer packaging. The surface patterns of the corrugated boxes were mostly lines and monochromatic patterns. However, in recent years, as people's requirements for the packaging of goods have become higher and higher, corrugated boxes have gradually shifted from the simple storage and transportation of the past to high-end sales and packaging. The corrugated cartons with novel designs, exquisite printing, and exquisite appearance not only attract people's attention, but also can increase the added value of the goods and enhance the market competitiveness of the products. However, at present, the overall level of corrugated box printing and processing in China is still relatively low, especially in the selection of processes and related equipment and supporting materials, there are still some misunderstandings. How to improve the printing and processing quality of corrugated boxes is of concern to the industry. On this issue, we interviewed some industry experts and manufacturers.

Printing process needs improvement

At present, most domestic corrugated cartons use flexo printing inks to directly print on-line die-cutting processing; another part uses first-printing facial paper, and then corrugated cardboard, and then the platform die-cutting processing method; India is rare.

Hongye Equipment Co., Ltd. Marketing Department Lu Xiangshang Manager: Inkjet direct printing + roller die cutting is the most consistent with the "fast, convenient, environmentally friendly, economical" principle of the processing method, so it has been widely used at home and abroad, in Europe and the United States about the carton 95% of the processing market is also 70% in China. The cost of offset printing is higher, and it is only suitable for a small number of orders with high definition requirements. After the pre-printing of the web gravure printing machine, the resolution can be greatly improved, the cost is slightly higher, and the production cycle is longer. In Europe and the United States Some countries and regions, such as Australia, South Korea and South Korea, have some development, and they are relatively rare in our country.

Chen Xianjun, vice director of the Institute of Printing Machinery Co., Ltd. of Shaanxi Province, believes that direct printing of corrugated cardboard has higher production efficiency, less material consumption, lower production costs, and large product specifications compared Wide range of applications, high strength carton, neat appearance, environmental protection and other advantages, is the main process of corrugated box printing. In particular, with the continuous development and improvement of corrugated box direct color gradation printing technology, the application of direct flexo printing of corrugated boxes will become more and more extensive. In China, the main printing method used for printing first-hand paper is to use offset printing. Although it is easy to obtain a more abundant printing effect, the processing method is labor-intensive, and it is only used in the processing of special-shaped corrugated boxes (boxes). More, the production efficiency is low, and the carton forming quality is poor. In foreign countries, more than 80% of color paper cartons are produced by direct printing. In China, color screens are still at the initial stage due to the use of color mesh-aligned corrugated box printing technology. This proportion is much lower and it is far from meeting the needs of market development.

Zhao Zengming, senior engineer of Guangdong Zhaoqing Jialong Packaging Machinery Group Co., Ltd., believes that the first printing of paper and then the printing process of the paper is more adaptable to paper, for some paper boxes or special Very absorbent carton is more suitable. But in the process of confrontation, the corrugated board will be damaged more or less, and the physical properties such as compressive strength of the carton will decline, which is inferior to the corrugated box directly printed and processed. The use of a flexographic plate direct printing method can complete the entire process of carton processing on a single machine. The processed carton board or carton is processed to reduce the paperboard positioning error caused by the process conversion, the processing accuracy is high, and the production efficiency is high. The low production cost is definitely the development direction of corrugated carton printing and processing.

Equipment supplies carefully selected

Direct printing on corrugated board is the development direction of corrugated box processing, and this is no doubt. However, to adapt to the development trend of color printing and screen printing, reasonable allocation and selection of equipment consumables plays an important role.

At present, corrugated box manufacturers in China can be roughly classified into three categories based on the characteristics of their equipment: One is a number of individual carton enterprises, and the scale of operations is relatively small. Most of them still use relatively backward single-machine manual operations, obsolete equipment, and production efficiency. Low, poor product quality is the object of elimination. The second is a leading part of the carton backbone enterprises. Its main equipment is domestically-made advanced equipment, with a high degree of automation and high production efficiency. The third is a small number of powerful wholly-owned or joint venture companies. They have introduced advanced corrugated board printing slot machines, die-cutting machines and other equipment to make corrugated paper from companies such as Emba in Sweden, Martin in France, Kiel in France, and Langston in the United States. Box production line, high degree of automation, high production efficiency, product quality is also high.

Shaanxi Printing Machinery Co., Ltd. is a key enterprise in China's packaging, decorating and printing machinery manufacturing industry. Its leading product YCW series corrugated board printing slotting machine technology ranks the leading domestic level, mainly used for three-color printing of 3 to 7 layers of corrugated cardboard. Color printing, indentation, slotting, corner cutting, buckle hand, air hole and other operations have a high market share. Faced with the current equipment configuration in the corrugated box industry in China, Deputy Director Chen Xianjun believes that the improvement of the printing quality of corrugated boxes in China requires a lot of efforts. However, the first step is to make great efforts in technological transformation of printing equipment and configure a high level of Three or more corrugated board printers. The corrugated board printing machine with high overlay accuracy, good running stability and reasonable system support is the primary condition for the production of high quality cartons.

Guangdong Zhaoqing Jialong Packaging Machinery Group Co., Ltd. is a designated manufacturer of corrugated paper box machinery of China National Packaging Corporation. According to the senior engineer of Cao Zincing, the printing slotting machine has formed a series, including: carton printing machine, printing slotting machine, Printing die-cutting units, printing slotting die-cutting combined units; in addition there are veneer machines, die-cutting machines, adhesive box machines, carton board processing machinery and other ancillary equipment. In recent years, some domestic carton printers have introduced some printing slot machines from abroad or Taiwan due to quality and efficiency considerations. However, this type of equipment is required to achieve rated productivity and processing quality, and the quality requirements for corrugated paperboard are both Higher, there are also certain requirements for ink. In fact, many home-made high-quality printing slotting machines adopt a lot of new technologies, new processes, and adopt computer control, which not only has high production efficiency, but also because the design is closely integrated with the national conditions, so not only is the price cheaper, but also has more flexibility. Strong, should be the first choice for domestic carton enterprises to transform their equipment. At present, the majority of domestic carton boxing uses boxing, but as the packaging requirements for packaging become more and more stringent, nails will not be allowed to rust and contaminate the contents. The need for refrigerated goods is even more so, so sticky boxes will It is the direction of future development.

In addition to equipment factors, Chen Xianjun, deputy director of the view that: a reasonable choice of anilox roller, to promote the use of large mesh ceramic anilox roller, the use of thin original plate and elastic liner and high-quality ink, to improve the printing of corrugated boxes System quality is also essential.

In recent years, Hongye Equipment Co., Ltd. has done a lot of work on corrugated carton supporting materials, in addition to providing users with a variety of high-quality consumables related to corrugated box printing, such as: ceramic anilox roller, long-life type drum die cut rubber pad In addition to carton size error equalizers, drum die cutters, plastic squeegees, and metal squeegees, it also pays great attention to the accumulation of experience and in-depth development of applied technologies. The manager of the company's Marketing Department, Lu Xiangxian, believes that in order to improve the printing quality of domestic corrugated boxes, it is indeed necessary to carefully select and closely cooperate with the equipment and related materials. The anilox roller has a great influence on the printing quality of the carton. If you choose improperly, it will cause “blocking, stencil printing, unclear printing, lack of hue restoration, poor level transition, insufficiency of color, serious dot expansion, and stripes on the color blocks. "Failure. In addition, the drum die-cutting quality of the carton also has a great influence on the overall quality of the corrugated carton. Because the pressure on the roller knife and the bottom rubber pad during die cutting is very large, therefore, it is necessary to use the hardened roller knife as far as possible, and then the bottom pad with high precision and extremely resistant cutting can effectively prevent the phenomenon of incomplete die cutting. The production. To solve the problem of unstable carton size, the most fundamental method is to eliminate the speed difference between the upper and lower rollers. The ideal solution is to configure the carton size error equalizer.

Shanghai Aookeli Printing Machinery Co., Ltd. is a supplier of flexo and corrugated box printing equipment and equipment. In addition to providing high-quality ceramic anilox rolls, it also provides R/bak air cushions for printing plates and inks. Village-type version, ink cleaning products, squeegee, ink tester, density meter and a series of corrugated box printing supplies and ancillary products. The general manager of the company, Gui Gui, said in an interview with this publication that it is very easy to overlook the maintenance of ceramic anilox rollers. In the case of thin resin plates, professional lithographs are not used. . The goal of AuCorp is to provide some products and technical services for the areas that people ignore.

Speaking of the major problems existing in the selection and use of corrugated boxes for printing and supporting materials by domestic corrugated box users, the general situation is that there is a large market for corrugated boxes in China, and there are also many manufacturers of corrugated boxes, but manufacturers who can produce good products are able to process them. Not much. An important reason for this is that there are no problems in solving the process and supporting materials from improving the quality of the printing process. No matter what type of machine is used, it is difficult to achieve the goal of improving quality if it does not pay attention to its quality and function when selecting supporting materials. The role of printing matching materials in the entire carton production is critical. If you do not use matching materials that can improve print quality, this is not only a waste of materials, but also a waste of equipment resources. There is a causal relationship between the production input and the benefits of the product. The key is to see how to handle it. The R/bak air-cushion lining plate that we provide to domestic users now is a kind of professional printing pad, it has already been used in the world extensively. Thanks to its open-cell microporous structure, it does not close the air inside when it is compressed, and it provides consistent resilience, so it can compensate and buffer printing pressure. It can be used together with thin resin plates to avoid printing. The network expansion and the phenomenon of white space in the field, applied to different grades of corrugated board printing presses, can all significantly improve the printing quality. For cable screen printing and field printing, the effect is more obvious. However, due to its high price, when we recommend it to users, we have encountered the problem of increasing costs and whether it is worth investing. After our work in recent years, at present, the application of R/bak liners in China has gradually become popular, and the market is also well-received. The main reason is that the effect is obvious after users use it, which improves the printing quality and brings new business. R/bak pads have a long service life and have more technical and quality advantages than non-professional pads. Some carton printers have improved the quality of their domestic and old equipment after using R/bak liners, and the printing has been upgraded; some imported equipment has already been supplied with R/bak liners from the factory; many domestic Carton equipment manufacturers are also working with us to use R/bak pads as standard equipment. For the cleaning and maintenance of the anilox roller, we also encountered the same problem. After encountering problems, some carton manufacturers first think about the problem of ink and plate, and contact the ink supplier and the plate maker first. The problem cannot be solved. Finally, we found the solution to the problem from the cleaning and maintenance of the anilox roller. At present, many large-scale carton factories in China are provided with cleaning technologies and products, which have changed the habit of not paying attention to the anilox roller cleaning. However, in the small and medium carton factories, the phenomenon of neglecting the cleaning and maintenance of the anilox roller is still widespread, and it is necessary to change the concept.

Corrugated carton proofing is also often overlooked by domestic carton manufacturers. At present, carton proofing mainly includes the following methods: proofing on printing presses, proofing on proofers, traditional film proofing and digital proofing. The proofing on the printing press is actually a trial printing. Due to the use of printing inks and officially printed substrates, equipment, and consumables, the cost is higher. Proofing on proofers currently uses offset printing, which is usually done on paper rather than on corrugated cardboard. The proofs cannot represent the actual effect of direct printing on corrugated boxes, and the equipment and consumables required are very expensive. Very high. The most used traditional proofing program in the industry is Cromarin proofing. Usually, several sets of film are made for proofing. The arrival of the digital era has brought about the digitization of proofing, but the current carton industry is very