imagepac

User Guide
PhotoCentriC Ltd. Doc. no. : 04/001 Revision no. : 8 Date : 22/11/12

1.

Introduction

Welcome to a new world of plate making. imagepac is a revolutionary product that has established itself as the plate making product of choice for most stamp manufacturers.

2.

Photocentric commitment

PhotoCentriC will supply products of the highest quality at all times. In the unlikely event of any complaint being raised about product quality it will be dealt with promptly. If no solution is possible the product will be replaced without quibble. Photocentric will provide full technical assistance on imagepac, imagebox and the whole stamp making process from negative to marking device.

3.

imagepac xtra

imagepac xtra is the worlds first commercially available pre-packaged sachet of liquid photopolymer resin incorporating a substrate. Its a better way to manufacture stamps giving you all the benefits of using polymer without the drawbacks. It is now no longer necessary to construct a polymer plate out of the four components (substrate, damming tape, coverlay and resin) you can do all of that by just taking the sachet out of the box. imagepac gives you the finished article of a printing plate prior to exposure, in one easy to use package. imagepac is patented in the UK under GB2372575. imagepac is patented in the US under 09/985034 imagepac is patent pending in Europe under 02 755 145.6 imagepac, imagebox and Photocentric are registered trademarks of Photocentric Ltd.

4.

1st Stage create design Work from the customer order to typeset the artwork. 2nd Stage make negative Create a negative from the artwork by direct printing using a leaser or inkjet printer. 3rd Stage make plate Expose the imagepac, wash it out, post expose it and dry it. 4th Stage - stamp assembly Cut the stamp from the plate and adhere it to the stamp base.

The stamp manufacturing process

5.
5.1

The advantages of using imagepac and imagepac xtra

Quality

imagepac sachets are sealed without any air in them so you dont ever have to see an air bubble again. We guarantee the purity of resin in each sachet by filling the resin from bulk in a clean, automated, quality controlled environment. Hand pouring of resin can introduce contaminants and can subject it to light degradation. We can provide you with consistent plate thickness. The fill quantity of resin in a sachet determines the depth of the plate. Our fill weights produce plates that are accurate to 0.15mm.

5.2

Cost

imagepac saves you 10 minutes on average, reducing your labour costs or nearly doubling your potential output by halving your production time. imagepac provides you with a printing plate without the costly packaging you then throw away. It is the most labour saving device for polymer manufacture, saving you money on time, waste materials, reject plates and the inevitable cleaning involved in the conventional method! It also allows you to hold less stock, releasing cash.

5.3

Time

imagepac saves the operator the entire plate assembly time. This is usually over ten minutes. It removes the time in handling drums or resin, decanting them or loading them into dispense buckets.

5.4

Simplicity

imagepac is so easy to use even untrained people can make stamps. This makes it possible to cover the absence of the skilled plate maker with non-skilled staff. Also because its clean and pleasant other staff will make stamps with it.

5.5

Stock

imagepac is a complete plate making system. Previously, a plate maker would have to ensure that they always held enough of four separate components, the absence of any one would prevent manufacture. This would lead to inevitable overstocking. At a glance it is now possible to ascertain how many stamps you can make from stock.

5.6

Cleanliness

imagepac is a sealed package of resin. It is no longer necessary to pour thick, sticky resin from one container to another. No more spillage and stickiness on the floor.

6.
6.1

The plate making process

Preparation

If you are using the machine for the first time that day, warm the bulbs up for three to five minutes. The critical time in plate making is the first time or back exposure which makes the floor. As bulbs are often cold when starting, and bulbs give out much more light when hot, the hardening effect and depth of floor varies significantly from cold to hot. A small variance in the height of floor has a greater effect than a large change in the main exposure. So cold bulbs often give low plate floors and lead to wobbly lines or text falling off. Use spacers to ensure even compression. These should be exactly the depth of plate that you require, remember that the negative is usually 0.15mm in thickness. We supply two different depths of sachet as standard.2.3mm (90) is most common in Europe, (use 2.5mm spacers) and 2.55mm (100) which is most common in the US (use 2.7mm bearers). Ensure that the glass bed is clean and dry. The negative should be dry and with the black of high enough density to stop UV. To check the quality of your negative, hold it up to the light and see if you can light through the black parts or use a densitometer to accurately measure it- a figure of 2.8 or above is acceptable. If you can see through then it is likely the plate will be of poor quality as well (although UV-transmitting and daylight-transmitting are not always the same). The plate quality will ultimately only be as good as the quality of the negative.

If your negative is smaller than the lower exposure glass then light will come up around it and bounce of the machine and the upper glass to fill the floor in particular at the edges, leading to an uneven or filled in floor. Avoid this happening by blacking-off around the negative. Lay a masking template around your negative to make it the same size as the lower glass. Otherwise, A8 will produce a much larger floor than A4 with the same exposure timers. Using the masking template means that now all the sizes will expose the same. TIPS Hold the sachet by its seam, never its middle- this avoids creasing it. Make sure the sachet is at least 7mm (3/8) larger than the text in the negative to avoid the curvature at the edge. Place imagepac xtra and imagepac down so that the printing imagepac is readable. The flexible side will always be next to the negative. Always mask off with light-stopping material around a negative.

6.2

Exposing imagepac

Close your exposure unit. The upper glass should exert enough pressure to remove all wrinkles and flatten the sachet. Set the exposure times. These will be specific to your machine. If you are using imagepac on an imagebox exposure unit then these times are provided. If you are using your existing exposure unit then you should use the same exposure times as you were using with liquid resin, but extend the back exposure by about 10-15 secs as a starting point. Different exposure units have different light configurations producing different light intensities. As bulbs age they produce less light, often less evenly distributed down the tube. For these reasons it is not possible to state exact times to expose a perfect imagepac on every machine.

6.3

Setting the right exposure times

This method will help you set the exposure times accurately when you use imagepac. It will also help you perfect plate quality if you are finding it difficult to hold fine relief or you are filling in fine reverses. Calculating the back exposure time To save cost, use A7, A8 or A9 sized sachets for setting times. Lay the sachet on the exposure unit. Expose the sachet for 30 seconds on the back only- do not use the main exposure. Remove the sachet, wash it out and measure the floor thickness. Aim for a floor depth that is just under half the total plate thickness (35-45% is ideal). Adjust this time accordingly to achieve the desired floor thickness, this is your back exposure time. Calculating the main exposure time If you only have one set of bulbs or the upper and lower lights are the same, then the main exposure will as a rule of thumb be about 8x the back exposure time. Use a negative that has fine relief and reverse on it. Ideally use a specially made test negative. Place the negative on the unit and the sachet on top of it. Expose for the back exposure time that you have just set.

You will probably want to set a standard main exposure time for all of your plates. However, in some cases you should adjust your main and back exposure according to your artwork. Calculating the correct main exposure time depends upon how deep the floor is, how much of the negative is black and the fineness of the artwork. Start with a main exposure time that is seven times the length of time of the back exposure you have just set. Remove the sachet and without cutting it open, press it between your finger and thumb. The relief should be firm to the touch surrounded by liquid resin. If the plate is under-exposed the relief will not be attached to the floor. In this case if you squeeze the sachet, the text will move freely in the resin. To rectify this increase the main exposure time by 30 seconds and repeat the process until the text holds. If the plate is overexposed the pools of liquid resin will be shallow or non-existent and the fine reverses will have filled in. The plate will feel rigid with very little liquid resin present. To rectify this decrease the main exposure time by 30 seconds and repeat the process until the text is surrounded by liquid resin. When you have perfected the main exposure time, wash this plate out, post-expose it and check that you are happy with the fine reverses and reliefs in detail using an eye glass. Under exposed plate

Here the shoulder of the relief has not been formed properly and is extremely concave in cross-section. In the extreme cases this will lead to the fine relief being washed away in the wash out process. Good plate

Here the shoulder to the fine relief is slightly concave in cross-section, the angle of the shoulder being 30 degrees to the vertical. The fine reverses have also held. Over exposed plate

Here the shoulder is in excess of 30 degrees to the vertical and the fine reverses have filled in.

Typical machine exposure times

This can only be used as a rough guide as exposure times vary from machine to machine. As the lamps age the times should be extended. Times should also be adjusted if you wish to hold very fine work, in general this means increasing the floor and reducing the main time. If the negative has a relatively small amount of black film on it then you should reduce the main exposure, correspondingly if has a relatively small amount of clear film on it then you should increase the main exposure. If you are trying to hold very fine relief then you can increase the floor to about 60% of the total plate thickness as this makes it easier to hold fine relief.

Clear imagepac
Machine Type Large format eg. ALF11 Medium format eg. AZ or Framun imagebox 9 Back Exposure 30- 50 secs 40 - 100 secs 20 secs Main Exposure 100 - 140 secs 140 300 secs 450 secs

imagepac exposed with a UV lamp of intensity of 0.4 mW/cm 2 @ 365nm wavelength will in 1 minute, provide a depth of cure of 1.7mm. TIPS Use correct depth of bearers- plates must always be flat- uneven plates produce uneven relief. Ensure sachet is free from creases. If using imagepac choose a back exposure that gives a floor that is about half the total plate thickness. If using imagepac xtra set it to about 35-45%. Set a main exposure that holds all of the fine relief without filling in the reverses. If you are trying to hold very fine relief then you can increase the floor to about 60% of the total plate thickness as this makes it easier to hold fine relief.

6.4

Cutting open imagepac

Before washing out the sachet you will need to cut it open to reveal the liquid resin. You can either cut the border off with scissors or the preferred method is to cut out the plastic front out with a scalpel. You will find that cutting with a scalpel will provide the plate with support later when washing it out. Place the sachet on a flat surface, with the side with the text in reverse on, facing up. Cut through the film on all four sides, just in from the seal.

TIPS Cut just the outer plastic only, leave all the back plastic as it supports it in the wash.

6.5

Washing out the plate

Mounting the sachet to a rotating drum wash out Cut the sachet with a scalpel, never scissors. Hold the sachet so that the side with the text in reverse is facing outwards. Place the plastic edge of the sachet under the teeth in the clamp and close them so that they pierce the film only, not the plate.

Rotate the drum using the foot pedal ensuring that the plate lies tightly around the drum. Peel off the cut plastic face to expose the plate and liquid resin. Reverse the lower clamp so that using the flat edge as a clamp. Clamp the plate securely so that it is tight to the drum. Ensure you have added the correct concentration of wash out solution (typically 2%) and anti-foam (typically 0.7%). Spray wash for 6 minutes, finally turn on the rinse spray for thirty seconds to clean the plate. Mounting the sachet to a rotating plate wash out Open the wash out unit lid and ensure the sticky green base plate is dry. You can use a squeegee to dry it quickly. Either cut around the edge, just in from the seal with scissors or using a scalpel cut the side with the text in reverse on. Cut through the outer plastic only, just in from the seal. Stick the sachet to the base plate so that the side with the text in reverse, faces out, taking care to press the edges down firmly.

Ensure that you have added the correct concentration of wash out developer (typically 2%) to the water bath. Wash out for 4 minutes, remove the plate and rinse it.

Washing out by hand Using a scalpel cut just inside the seal on the side which has the text in reverse on it. Peel off the side of plastic that was facing the negative. Fill a tray with about half an inch of hot water. Add a generous amount of wash out developer. Take a firm brush and using a circular motion briskly remove all traces of liquid polymer.

Do not damage the plate by brushing too hard, remember that the plate will not gain full strength until after post exposure. This process should take about three minutes. Rinse the plate and check that it is clean. TIPS Use warm water and wash-out agent its better than washing up detergent. Dont wash out in water hotter than your hand can take, it will soften the polymer (60C max). imagepac washes out much quicker than pouring polymer. Normal brushing will not damage the image on a well-made plate.

6.5

Post exposing the plate

If you wish to ensure a completely dry tack-free printing surface then dissolve a teaspoon of imagepac de-tac salts in the post exposure water. If using imagepac leave the rear side of the plastic on to get a naturally sticky back, remove it if you want to back polymer to be dry to touch. Dry plate in a dryer TIPS Post expose using germicidal light for a more complete surface cure. When using imagepac leave the plastic back film on during post exposure to give a sticky back, remove it to get a dry back. Add post exposure salts if the plate is still tacky. Sunlight is effective at post exposure.

7.

What makes a good quality printing plate?

A good quality stamp plate will transfer the finest relief images (such as full stops) whilst still holding fine reverses (such as the centre of as). It will also produce a perfect representation of the tonal shades, transferring the correct amount of ink. It will have enough relief depth to prevent the stamp base from back-filling with ink. It will be resilient to repeated use over the years, providing the same image after 1,000,000 impressions as it did on day one. The ideal plate should have a floor just under half the total plate thickness so that the floor doesnt transfer ink. It should hold fine relief hold under compression. The relief on a photopolymer printing plate is formed when the light penetrates through the negative. Because the curing mechanism for photopolymer is inhibited by air, the relief is actually formed on the floor and the upper film simultaneously eventually meeting in the middle. This is why an underexposed dot will be egg-timer shaped or concave. As polymer shrinks by about 3.5% on curing, this would lead to the image being not a dimensionally representative image of the negative, but a slightly reduced one. However the liquid resin surrounding the cured product moves into to fill the void and in turn polymerises, so the final cured plate is exactly the form of the clear part of the negative. Expose through the negative just long enough so that the shoulders of the fine reliefs are at 30 degrees to the vertical. This will give small dots the rigidity to withstand the wash out and to hold firmly without flexing when under the pressure of printing. To hold fine detail on a negative, increase the floor and reduce the main exposure time. Typical printing values of imagepac plate exposed on an imagebox exposure unit:

Screen Values at 150 lpi 3% min and 85% max Fine line/reverse line widths 0.1mm Reverse/isolated dot diameter 0.2mm Type size/ type size reverse 3 pt

8.

Applying imagepac to the stamp base

1. Self-inkers Cut out the plate that you wish to use and trim the edges. Press down the sides of the selfinker to push up its base. Remove the adhesive backing. If the stamp base does not have a self-adhesive backing, imagepac plates will adhere satisfactorily to the plastic base just by removing the backing plastic. Gently press the stamp down at one end and let the rest fall in place. Take care not to stretch the plate. It is not necessary to force the plate when attaching it as it will be pressed into place by the stamping action.

2. Hand stamps Cut the plate out that you wish to use and carefully trim its edges Peel off the adhesive backing.

Either Gently lay the stamp on the adhesive backing taking care not to stretch it. Let it fall down rather than push it. If you apply it incorrectly you can realign it, just pull it off gently and repeat.

Or Remove the cover of the mount and lay it flat side up. Place the stamp face down on the cover.

Using the base as a guide, holding the stamp base and mount in both hands, gently lower the adhesive base of the mount, with the adhesive backing removed, down onto the stamp. Press down and lift up.

3. Date stampers Always apply tape to imagepac plate before using on a dater. Cut out the stamp and carefully trim its edges. Lay the stamp face down on your table. Apply double sided tape to the base of the stamp and trim. Use a scalpel to cut out the rectangular space for the date. Peel of the adhesive backing and place stamp on the dater. Adjust the depth controlling screws to ensure that the date is at the same height as the plate.

TIPS imagepac xtra cannot be stretched. imagepac can be stretched, so take care when applying. You can apply tape to the back of the imagepac plate, lay the plate face down on a clean smooth surface and then apply the tape to the back of it in a sweeping motion to avoid air bubbles. Alternatively attach one edge of the plate to the adhesive stamp base and let the rest fall into place or lay the plate face down and lower the adhesive stamp mount down onto it.

info@photocentric.co.uk

www.photocentric.co

The information contained herein is produced in good faith, and is believed to be reliable but is for guidance only. PhotoCentriC and its agents cannot assume liability or responsibility for results obtained in the use of its products by persons whose methods are outside or beyond our control. It is the users responsibility to determine the suitability of any of the products and methods of use or preparation prior to use mentioned in our literature and furthermore the user's responsibility to observe and adopt such precautions as may be advisable for the protection of personnel and property in the handling and use of any of our products.

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