Apr 7 2006
A deeper black, a more brilliant cyan – BASF is adding two new colors to its Bafixan® P 100 HS sublimation ink range for inkjet printing. The deep Xtra Black shade ensures strong contrasts and an intense color experience. Its brilliant counterpart, turquoise, can be printed directly with the new cyan shade. This greenish blue is equivalent to a real process color and appears fresher and greener than comparable inks. The Bafixan® P 100 HS range as a whole, comprising the nine colors Yellow, Red, Light Red, Brilliant Blue, Light Brilliant Blue, Cyan, Black, Xtra Black and Gray, covers the entire color space for sublimation printing. It can also be used in direct printing.
Real quality indoors and out
The new shades allow BASF to offer a complete CMYK color palette for indoor applications and another for outdoors. “Tremendous quality demands are placed on prints for outside use, for example banners and parasols. They are exposed to direct sunlight and all sorts of weather conditions over a long period,” explains Dr. Gernot Diehlmann, head of the BASF inkjet team. “This causes the color molecules to undergo photochemical processes that can lead to the color changes we know as fading.” BASF has therefore developed particularly lightfast colors for outdoor applications. With Bafixan® P 100 HS Yellow, Red, Cyan and Xtra Black inks, outstanding light fastness ratings of 7 can be obtained. Fabrics printed with these inks retain their color intensity even after months outside. The lightfast colors are also ideal for sublimation printing on microfiber clothing and sportswear.
High-speed digital printing
Whether for indoor or outdoor applications, with Bafixan® P 100 HS inks, digital prints can be produced rapidly and reliably on nearly all polyester and polyamide surfaces. High-resolution, brilliant results are obtained even at extremely high printing speeds. An excellent quality standard is achieved even with a print setting of 360x360 dpi, 2 pass with ink feed from a refill system. Bafixan® P 100 HS inks are suitable for use on large-format digital printing machines with Epson heads, such as Mimaki, Mutoh and Roland, as well as variations and rebuilds of these printers. The inks dry very quickly on sublimation paper. They give good results even on relatively poor transfer papers. Bafixan® P 100 HS inks produce virtually no emissions in the form of fuming during transfer, and the transfer process is odorless. This optimizes both printing results and working conditions.