Screen Printing - June/July 2017 - 25

used in walls, floors, ceilings, countertops, partitions, shelves,
cabinets, doors, furniture, storage units, and much more.
Laminate floors and countertops are manufactured to
simulate the look of natural materials such as wood or
stone, and are popular because they are more affordable,
more durable, and easier to maintain. Plus, laminates made
from recycled materials are attractive to builders, decorators, and building owners who care about stopping deforestation and conserving natural resources.
You may not realize how prevalent laminates are until
you start looking for them, as I did recently. I noticed that
laminate panels are used on the reception desk, lockers, and
bathroom countertops at my gym. My office desk is made
from laminated wood. So are the bathroom stalls at the
Mandalay Bay Hotel's convention center in Las Vegas.
Because laminates are found in nearly every home, hotel,
store, restaurant, and office building, they represent a huge
opportunity for growth in industrial inkjet printing. To look
at just one application, Global Industry Analysts projects that
the global market for laminate flooring will reach 17.2 billion
square feet by 2020, due to improving construction activity,
technological advancements, and design innovations.
Yet in some applications such as countertops, laminates
have been steadily losing market share to engineered and
natural stone, metals, concrete, and recycled materials. Inkjet
could reverse that trend. Laminates are manufactured in a
variety of ways depending on the use: Floors and furniture
are made from composite granulated or chipped woods that
are pressed together at high temperatures and bonded with
melamine resin; countertops are made from layers of plastics
bonded on top of particle board or layers of Kraft paper.
Regardless of the construction, print plays a critical final
role. To create the desired aesthetics, an image printed on
a plastic film, paper foil, or thin sheet of wood (veneer) is
bonded to the surface of the laminate. Ultimately, the quality
of the printing determines whether the laminate looks cheap

On the
Surface

and cheesy or as beautiful as the natural product it simulates.
Analysts at Freedonia believe high-definition graphics that
provide a more stonelike appearance, which today's inkjet
technology makes possible, may help limit the decline of
laminated countertops. Freedonia projects that by 2019,
laminates will still account for about one-third of total
countertop sales, expected to reach 810 million square feet
and a value of $29.3 billion that year.
Laminates are a compelling application because aesthetics
alone could drive significant growth for inkjet. But throughout the décor world, other market forces such as consumer
demand for customized goods, pressure from retailers to
cut lead times and order quantities while offering a wider
range of options to shoppers, and the growing realization
that offshore mass manufacturing may no longer meet the
changing market's needs are creating an ideal environment
for inkjet. Smaller quantities of customized goods that must
be delivered rapidly simply do not play into the strengths of
traditional analog printing technologies.

Single-PaSS inkjetS for Décor Printing
The scale of these applications will require fast, reliable,
purpose-built production lines, which is where single-pass
inkjet technology comes in. Single-pass inkjet printers use
stationary printbars that span the full width of the print surface. Instead of making multiple passes back and forth across
the print surface, as traditional wide-format printers do, a
single-pass system applies all of the ink as the material moves
rapidly beneath the printbar.
Single-pass inkjet printers that use water-based inks are
already used in commercial printing, corrugated package
converting, and textile printing. Narrow-format single-pass
systems that use water-based or UV-curable inks are also in wide
use in the label industry. The technology isn't new to the décor
market - Barberán, a company we'll discuss in just a moment,
has offered such systems for a decade - but more players

One company that can enable the growth of
digital printing onto decorative surfaces is Metis
High Quality Scanners. Industrial printers can use
data captured by the Metis scanner to reproduce
the surfaces and textures of different types of
wood, stone, bricks, and leathers.
The Metis DRS 2000 scanner can capture
resolutions up to 3600 ppi from multiple angles
with carefully synchronized lighting. The Metis
Synchrolight scanning process and software can
capture, isolate, and deliver very high-resolution,
pixel-to-pixel, in-register surface data. Four
temperature-controlled LED light banks in the
Metis Synchrolight system work to ensure
objective, consistent, and repeatable color. The
scanner can capture originals that are up to 79 x 48
inches in area and up to 7.9 inches thick. Rob

Lawrence, director of sales for Metis, contends that
previous scanning systems "had fallen short of
giving designers, manufacturers, and ad marketers
the critical [data] needed to produce the highly
realistic surfaces their customers are demanding."
Metis scanner data can also be used to provide
accurate images for marketing materials, such
as printed and online catalogs and augmentedreality apps that enable interior designers to
preview how a specific laminate might look in a
particular location. The technology was originally
developed to help the Vatican capture and
preserve some of the world's most cherished
culture heritage materials.
Metis scanners are manufactured in Italy
and distributed in the US by CGS Publishing
Technologies.

june/july 2017

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Screen Printing - June/July 2017