Sun Chemical exhibits UV curing products

(NPES International Printing E-commerce Website 2008-12-26) Sun Chemical demonstrated Solarsmart SSM UV curing products for the laminated plastic card and security printing markets at the Cartes and Identification 2008 exhibition in Villepente, France.

The company said it can provide every type of ink required for all different plastic card applications, including ID cards, payment cards, loyalty cards, membership cards, smart cards, entry security cards and telephone cards.

The Solarsmart SSM ink range is claimed to be a breakthrough in UV curing ink technology and is designed for the blue chip plastic card market.

The range incorporates a full selection of bright, solid, high finish metallics, together with solid and translucent colours.

Sun Chemical added that the inks have the technical properties that are usually associated with the UV curing process, such as infinite screen stability, virtually instant drying, excellent blocking resistance, superior coverage, enhanced print definition and zero VOC emissions.

The inks can be printed onto PVC and PETg, the core material for many types of plastic cards.

Sun Chemical partnered with its parent company DIC to exhibit a full range of inks for laminated card production, including screen, offset, speciality and security inks.

DIC also exhibited its range of magnetic tape products, including colour tape, sparkling colour tape, logo tape, holographic magnetic tape and fluorescent tape.

'In addition to the visual and robustness properties inks and coatings give to plastic cards, there are a number of printable security features that can be applied for secure documentation and card production,' said Robin McMillan, European marketing manager for industrial inks at Sun Chemical.

Security is imperative in the plastic card market in order to maintain consumer confidence in the product.

Card manufacturers must therefore consider security features, such as overt and covert effects, forensic capabilities and multilevel combinations, as part of their overall printing solutions.