Application: Ceramic and Enamel
Longier‘s Racer and Performer series of printers have been designed especially for printing porcelain and
glass but are also perfect for printing enamel on e.g. metal sheets.
Ceramic inks, which are fused to the carrier at temperatures of about 1,200 °C, allow many applications not
possible for traditional organic inks.
Whereas all flat objects can be printed directly you need to do transfer printing for all non flat objects like
plates, cups, sinks or so. However, the process is quite simple and similar. Rather than print directly you print
on special transfer paper be printed directly, but printing can also be done by transfer with a special transfer
paper.
Ceramic inks contain special ceramic pigments, however, for binding to the base plate, a glass layer so called
glaze needs to be applied first. After printing the object will be put into an oven and be fired at about 1,200 °C.
However, it‘s not always suited applying glaze
so other inks containing the glass pigments
so called frits must be included.
Those inks are available and perfectly suited
for so called decoration printing and firing at
temperatures of 720°C or 850°C.
Please look for Performer series printer since
these inks need a more sophisticated ink
system and ink handling inside the printer.
Whether we talk about
enameling art or practical
application, plates up to 100
mm thickness (more on
request) can be printed
directly.
Ceramic prints are robust
against scratching, acids, UV-
light, ….. and can be used for
versatile applications like front
panels for electric devices, etc.
Digital printing on glass with ceramic inks has
been possible for a long time more or less
reserved for a company.
Together with a world-leading manufacturer of
ceramic inks, Longier has developed inks that
can also be used on our printers and offer the
same characteristics.
The glass samples on the left were first pre-
coated with Glaze and then printed with
"normal" ceramic inks. This has the advantage
that the printer has to be less complex.
Application: 2,000 sqm metro station wall covering - enamel
The ceramic glass inks contain, in addition to the pigments, the so-called frits, very small glass particles.
These particles melt at a temperature of about 720 - 800 + ° C depending on the thickness and condition of the
printed carrier. This can be glass, ceramic, transfer paper but also metal.
Although large-scale enamelling is usually carried out industrially by screen printing, the costs go to an infinite
number if separate screens have to be created for each panel. In digital printing, however, this is a "breeze" as
far as the right printer and the right ink is available.
For a big project, countless panels in different formats and shapes and of course different designs, the
manufacturing company decided to go with a LONGIER Racer printer with the glass decor ink.
The small films on the left show a panel when printing and a number of panels after installation in the subway
station.
Longier Digital Technologies
