How Long Do Anilox Rollers Last?

The anilox roller is the core component of the flexographic printing machine. The flexographic printing machine adopts a short ink supply system, which is mainly composed of four parts: ink tank, rubber roller, ink scraper and anilox roller.

Understanding the surface structure of the anilox roller:
There are many tiny concave holes with the same shape evenly distributed on the surface of the anilox roller, which are generally called "ink holes", and it is these ink holes that play the role of ink storage, ink uniformity and quantitative ink transfer in printing. The inking holes are generally carved in a 45° direction to the axis, and the partition wall between the inking holes is called the "mesh wall", and the area of the mesh wall is related to the shape of the ink hole. Generally speaking, the higher the number of threads of the anilox roller, the smaller the ink transfer volume, and vice versa.

Classification of anilox rolls:
Anilox rollers are classified according to the materials coated or sprayed on their surfaces, mainly including chrome-plated anilox rollers and ceramic anilox rollers. Metal anilox roller processing process: metal roller base - copper plating - engraving - chrome plating. Ceramic anilox roller processing process: metal roller base - copper plating - engraving - sandblasting - ceramic material spraying - polishing. From the comparison of engraving accuracy, printing resistance, ink transfer and release performance, because ceramic anilox rollers have more advantages, enterprises use ceramic anilox rollers more.

From the perspective of hardness, the difference in the service life of the anilox roller is analyzed: the hardness of the chrome plated anilox roller with the thickness of the electroplating layer is 0.01-0.15mm, and the coating thickness of the chromium oxide ceramic anilox roller is between 0.1-0.5 (excluding the thickness of the combined coating), and its hardness is up to Hv1300-1400, and the difference in hardness reveals that the anilox roller with higher hardness has more advantages in wear resistance, and after years of tempering, the service life of the chromium oxide ceramic anilox roller is 4-5 times longer than that of the chrome anilox roller.

In order to prolong the service life of the anilox roller, the daily maintenance measures of the anilox roller are as follows:
(1) Short-term shutdown, the anilox roller needs to keep rotating. When the machine is shut down for a long time, the anilox roller needs to be separated in time, the rubber pressure roller should be loosened, and the floating ink should be cleaned, so as to avoid the situation that the transverse uneven ink supply or the component ink is difficult to clean after drying.
(2) High-quality scraper is an important factor to ensure the use experience of anilox rollers. The hardness of the cutting edge of the scraper should be appropriate, not the harder the better. The shape of the cutting edge should also be appropriate, and care should be taken to replace the scraper regularly.
(3) Refuse to use inferior inks containing impurities. Place a magnetic filter in the ink tank to prevent metal impurities from scratching the anilox roller. Because clean ink prevents scratches on the anilox roller.
(4) Storage: When storing anilox rollers, it is necessary to wrap the rollers with packaging made of natural fibers; The anilox roller packaging is stored indoors in a dry place to prevent damage due to moisture, rain and direct sunlight. The rollers are fixed on a special stand when storing. Do not place the roller surface on the ground at an angle, otherwise it is easy to cause damage to the spray coating on the surface of the roller.
(5) After each printing, the surface of the cylinder must be cleaned in a timely and thorough manner to avoid the remaining ink remaining at the bottom of the mesh to dry and block the mesh, which is difficult to clean effectively, resulting in the reduction of volume, the reduction of ink release, and the impact of printing quality. Cleaning method: Wipe the ink with solvent first, and then use a special chemical cleaning agent to clean the mesh with a special stainless steel wire brush with a steel wire diameter of 0.07 mm.

How to choose the right number of aniloxes?
(1) Consider the fineness of the printed matter
Relatively speaking, the field, lines, text, etc. need a large amount of ink, and the number of reticulated lines is low; The color screen line pattern needs a small amount of ink and a high number of screen lines. In addition to the amount of ink supplied, the number of dots on the plate should also be considered. The fineness of the printed matter depends on the level of the number of dots, on the printing plate, after the size of the dots is determined, if the anilox roller of the lower number of lines is adopted, the area of each mesh cavity will be greater than the area of some dots on the printing plate, so that when printing, the dots will be immersed in the mesh cavities because there is no support of the partition wall, not only the surface of the dots will be inked, but also the side wall will be inked, which will lead to the increase of the dots, for example, for the color block of 80% of the dot area ratio will lead to paste death, printing into the ground, and at the same time lead to the fault of edge ghosting. Practice has proved that in order to obtain superior quality printing, the number of anilox lines of the anilox roller and the number of dot lines of the printing plate should maintain a good ratio of about 4:1.
(2) Consider the substrate and printing requirements
Different substrates have different ink absorption, and different substrate inks have different drying methods, so the factors of ink demand for substrate materials should be fully considered.

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