Jack organises Global Distributor Conference in China
Established in August 2003 in China, Jack Sewing Machine Co. Ltd., started sewing machine business from July 18, 1995. And ever since 2010, the sales amount of Jack is leading in global sales with the absolute advantage of lockstitch, overlock and interlock sewing machine. On October 21st, 2018 the annual Jack Global Distributor Conference was held in Taizhou International Hotel. In the beginning, Ruan Jixiang, the Founder of Jack, delivered a keynote speech on value marketing at the conference. According to him, the strategy of focusing; focusing on small and medium-sized customers, focusing on the lockstitch, overlock and interlock machine, focusing on the development of quality and technology is the way to achieve no. 1 ranking in sales, value marketing, and becoming leading company in the world.
In the new era of intelligence, regardless of the traditional business or the future market, he said that the price war will not only defeat the unbeaten competitors, but also indirectly affect the value of the brand itself, but also bring a vicious circle to the industry. What Jack needs to do is to create value for customers by quality and technology, and let the whole industry move towards benign development. Only by moving towards value marketing can we go closer to Jack’s first brand of global sewing equipment.
Later, at the meeting, he shared the contrast between smart sewing and traditional sewing for the dealers present. For example, the sewing machine A5 with short trimming(no need to cut again), the technology not only solves the difficulty of recruiting labour for the garment processing factory, but also brings high sales volume and high quality reputation to the clothing brand.
The consumer demand for improvement, for quality is increasing, and intelligent sewing products can help Jack in the value war from price war. Jimmy, General Manager of the sewing machine department, brought the industry analysis to overseas distributors, and made in-depth description from the macro trend, market customers, sewing industry and Jack’s own aspects.
In November 2015, the supply-side reform was formally proposed. With the implementation of the national environmental protection tax collection policy, environmental protection and safe production became the threshold of the manufacturing industry in China, including clothing. The elimination of backward production capacity was accelerated.
The continuous deepening of supply-side reform has improved the market concentration degree of the industry. The growing market share of leading enterprises represents new opportunities for Jack. He pointed out that, with a global perspective and an overview of the development trend of international clothing, garment factories need more advanced equipment as consumers purchase more frequently and demand higher quality of clothing. In such a context, Jack is the market leader in terms of user awareness and data in both the brand and the product.
Presently, Jack company’s sales account for a very high share in more than 105 industrial sewing machine factories in China. The sales performance is far ahead, which will accumulate more potential energy for Jack and its dealers. Then, by presenting data comparison of the sales performance of sewing machine enterprises in the first half of 2018, he helped distributors to further understand Jack’s influence in the field of sewing machines in China and even the world, and anticipated the huge potential and development scale of the sewing machine market.
He said that from the acquisition of Germany’s Bullmer in 2009 to the acquisition of Italy’s VI. BE. MAC this year, Jack has entered the stage of multi-brand operation and multi-industry production supply chain coordination. Jack has not only brand, product, capital, but also product, technology, quality, service and personnel. With 9 R&D centers, 1000 R&D teams, and 14 offices in over 130 countries around the world, we provide local services and technical support, provide win-win global co-operation opportunities and realize the aspiration of “co-construction, sharing and win-win.”
Victor, Vice General Manager of international trade department, reported on the theme of innovation channel and value creation. At the conference, he showed Jack’s promising market and business development in the world in 2018, as well as the great success of Jack’s products in all markets around the world. He listed a number of statistics to prove that Jack is covering around the world. The reasons for Jack’s good performance overseas are explained in detail in the aspects of product, service, training and brand:
In terms of training, the training mode of “technicians going out to overseas markets” and “overseas technicians invited to China” are combined, as well as the cooperation made with training schools. The quick service is more and more in-depth for users. After the service training for agents and sub-dealers, the service starts to develop to the terminal and facilitates sales. Many countries have regular service day to train terminal operators and so on.
Jack’s success in 2018, he said, depends on the strong support and hard work of his family of dealers around the world. Meanwhile, the work priorities of 2019 were elaborated in detail, including increasing investment in brand publicity, product innovation, channel construction, professional training, etc. It aims to face customers with the most valuable products and services, and build core competitive advantages to make dealers successful.
Many overseas distributors have made very infectious sharing for us, telling us how they get acquainted with the sewing machine industry and Jack, as well as their market situation, company situation and successful experience. At the end of the meeting, Vincent, the Vice Chairman of Jack, gave summary for the meeting. He once again emphasized the importance of value marketing. Not only the agent but also dealers have value marketing abilities. Agent also need to help dealers to get this ability of value marketing, stimulate the potential of dealers, and achieve greater victories.
At the same time, he also emphasized the customer-centric aspect; helping customer to success is the most essential part of any business, the reason is very simple, but not everyone really understands, and not everyone can practice it. As a dealer, do you understand the pain points of customers? How do you manage your time and how much time is it spent on your customers? These are questions worth thinking by all the dealers. Finally, he said that Jack is committed to helping dealers grow, helping dealers develop distributors, and better serve their customers to achieve their success.
In order to thank the distributors for their dedication in the past year, the conference honored outstanding teams and individuals who have made outstanding contributions and presented awards. A total of 67 distributor families received different categories of awards.
Jacks lays foundation stone of new manufacturing unit
Jack focuses on industrial intelligent sewing machine, automatic cutting machine and motor & control box. It is the only intelligent manufacturing complete solution service provider integrated pre-sewing equipment and mid-sewing equipment in the global sewing equipment industry. Jack has more than 5,000 agents and service center in more than 120 countries.
Jack’s overseas acquisition co-operation began in 2009. German Automatic cutting machine Bullmer company enjoys the “Mercedes-Benz” reputation in pre-sewing industry and has more than 80-year history, which became a member of Jack in that year. In July, 2017, Jack acquired Italian MAICA, which is the onlyprofessional manufacturer to produce shirt automatic equipment in the world for more than 40 years. The acquisition of VI.BE.MAC marks Jack’s globalization made another historic progress. VI.BE.MAC with 38-year history is the leader of industry sewing machine for jeans. However, many factors constrain the development of VI.BE.MAC. foreign markets. In the Asian market, especially in the Chinese market it faces challenges from other peers.
Today, Asia is the main production area of jean clothing. China, Bangladesh, India, Indonesia, Pakistan, Cambodia, Vietnam, Myanmar, etc., are the big countries in jean clothing production. And China is the world’s largest denim clothing production base. The company, who owns the Chinese market, is equal to half the sky in the jean clothing production market. Jack’s co-operation with VI.BE.MAC. will achieve this possibility. Both the companies have same target that not only provides products but also offer the solution to meet customers’ need. After the acquisition of VI.BE.MAC., Jack will give full play to advantages in supply chain, production, technology, channels etc.
The acquisition of VI.BE.MAC marks Jack’s globalization made another historic progress. Taking this further, Jack Sewing Machine recently laid foundation stone of its high-end intelligent sewing equipment manufacturing unit in Juhai Avenu, Taizhou, China. The ceremony was led by Heye, Director, China Sewing Machinery Association (CSMA) along with the Chairman of Jack Group and Mayor of Taizhou city, in the presence of some of the Government officials from the region.
The land, covering around 7.6 lakh sq mtr area, was recently allotted to Jack by the Taizhou Government. Apart from the manufacturing base, it will also witness the start-up activities of the provincial and municipal major projects related to the sewing industry. The manufacturing base will take about 3 years to get completed and after the completion of the project, it will have an annual production capacity of 2 mn sets of intelligent sewing machines and 1,00,000 sets of intelligent special sewing machines.
The high-end intelligent sewing equipment manufacturing base is an important measure for the company to expand and upgrade to become a complete service provider of intelligent equipment. As per the company, manufacturing will be completely robotic right from loading, unloading to assembly of parts of sewing machines.
According to Jixiang Ruan, Jack Stock, founder, “We share with VI.BE.MAC.’s philosophy and values and are grateful to the mutual knowledge in these years. After the acquisition – due to the added value that Jack can bring in terms of supply, production and distribution in China and in the world, with its more than 5,000 sales and service channels in more than 120 countries – we will share with VI.BE.MAC. an even wider market. Moreover, thanks to the brand, the experience and the technological know-how of the VI.BE.MAC. Units, we will enrich the automation of our products with the aim of quickly entering the market for the denim clothing automation, establishing a position of leadership in this area.”
The new manufacturing base will be helpful to reduce the cost of manufacturing of MAICA and VI.BE.MAC. Also, Jack will be producing its future high-end ‘A’ series lockstitch machines in this facility.
Industry-leading technology behind Ci7x00 Family of Spectrophotometers
The Ci7x00 is the flagship family of bench top spectrophotometers in X-Rite’s broad portfolio of colour solutions. Offering the highest level of both accuracy and consistency in measurement, the Ci7x00 family has set a new standard for colour control across formulation, production and quality assurance. This technical paper provides detailed insight into the technology powering these revolutionary products.
A Legacy of Innovation
The technology powering Ci7x00 instruments is the product of decades of innovation in colour measurement. X-Rite’s CE7000 benchtop spectrophotometer, launched in 1989, used a photodiode array for measuring colour. When the CE7000 was introduced, the photo diode array offered the best design and performance options available for measuring light and processing colour.
In the 1990s, X-Rite started to investigate the use of two-dimensional charge-coupled device (2D CCD) arrays as light detectors in instruments. These types of imagers provided low noise and excellent linearity and opened the door to the design of a multi-channel benchtop spectrophotometer— the Color i7. This pioneering product achieved a new level of performance, and provided simultaneous measurement of specular included (SCI) and specular excluded (SCE), along with the reference channel, to enable tightly coupled real-time correction of illumination uniformity.
X-Rite’s legacy of innovation continued in 2015 with the introduction of the Ci7x00 family. These instruments combine the latest advances in 2D CCD array technology with sophisticated processing capabilities to deliver the industry’s most accurate and repeatable colour measurement yet.
The powerful array that makes it possible
At the heart of a Ci7x00 instrument is a highresolution spectrometer that couples an aberration-corrected diffraction grating with a highquality 2D CCD that is suitable for scientific instrumentation. The all-reflective design provides exceptional control over stray light, resulting in minimal spectral and spatial cross-talk in the CCD detector. This enables remarkable measurement purity, which leads to excellent dark and light repeatability and colour accuracy.
The Ci7x00 family’s 2D CCD array allows simultaneous, full spectral imaging of multiple measurement channels: Reference channel, SCI, and SCE. Since all measurement channels are imaged simultaneously with the reference channel on the 2D CCD array, any changes to the instrument’s light source or drift in wavelength can be detected in realtime and corrected in all measurement channels. Additionally, with the measurement channels being imaged together on the same physical 2D CCD array, the correction of errors from electrical noise and drift is greatly simplified.
In the instruments, each channel is connected by glass optical fibres to the input slit on the spectrometer. The spectrometer maps the spectral dispersion of each channel in one direction on the CCD, with the spatial dispersion mapped in a perpendicular direction to create a 2-dimensional reading. In the spectral direction, a wavelength sampling interval of just over 1nm/pixel spreads the spectrum across hundreds of CCD pixels, and produces a calibrated output range of 360 to 780nm—the most expansive wavelength range on the market.
State-of-the-art data processing and correction
In addition to its advanced 2D CCD array, the Ci7x00 instruments use multiple data processing techniques to achieve accuracy and precision. Wavelength bands are over-sampled both spatially and spectrally to provide more than 750 CCD pixel samples per wavelength per flash. Each measurement is executed through multiple flashes, which creates a “super pixel” with an effective dynamic range that exceeds that of a typical photodiode array. This results in a 20x improvement of resolution and signal-to-noise when compared to common one-dimensional technologies.
Signal-to-noise is also effectively managed through over-sampling. A dark blue repeatability test best demonstrates the Ci7x00’s advances in this area. The Ci7x00 series outperforms other manufacturers as well as our own previous benchtop spectrophotometers on this test. The system also incorporates colour balance filters to flatten the input light at the detector so that dynamic range is carefully managed in order to optimize signal-to-noise in the CCD. This provides low noise at all wavelengths, and clean signal detection without saturation, leakage, or crosstalk between pixels. The Ci7x00 series also implements a continuous wavelength calibration in real-time that is used to re-align the spectrum with the factory reference spectrum using no moving parts. Along with other corrections, it is this innovative whole-system design approach that allows the leading Ci7x00 device, the Ci7860, to deliver industry-leading repeatability of <0.01 E and inter-instrument agreement as tight as =0.06 E.
Finally, measurement accuracy can be affected by the amount of optical power being instantaneously delivered to a sample by the illumination system, especially while measuring certain fluorescent materials. Photodiode array-based spectrophotometers typically take a measurement with a single high-powered flash. Measurement differences caused by this over-powered illumination can temporarily alter some samples, resulting in colour measurement errors up to 1 E. X-Rite’s Ci7x00 spectrophotometers use multiple lower-power flashes during a colour measurement to help minimize and control this error. These are light conditions that more closely match the way the human eye sees these special samples.
Streamline your workflow
Establishing and achieving the strictest colour standards requires accuracy and precision at each stage of the product development process, from formulation to final production to quality control.The Ci7x00 series solution offers the unique ability to maintain an audit trail, ensuring data traceability and integrity of standards throughout production. In the event that a product falls outside of a specified tolerance, this traceability allows for quick identification of the sources of error. Users can easily review measurement and process variables, including temperature humidity, and even a picture of the sample being measured, during each step of the production.
The Ci7x00 family’s advanced technology for accurate capture and data processing also allows operators to achieve a new level of efficiency in controlling colour. Simultaneous SCI and SCE data capture eliminates the need for multiple measurements as well as the effort and potential error associated with adjusting the instrument’s mechanical set-up between measurements. This is particularly valuable for the measurement of samples exhibiting gloss and texture. The ability to combine measurements of reflection and transmission also allows colour experts to gather accurate data for colour and translucency in a single operation.
The Ci7x00 family offers users additional measurement flexibility with optional UV wavelength cut-off filters, four transmission apertures (25 mm to 6mm) with active laser targeting, and up to five reflectance apertures (25 mm to 3.5 mm).The 2D CCD arrays used in the Ci7x00 family have enabled the design of industry leading instrumentation with unmatched accuracy, repeatability, and inter-instrument agreement. Customer workflow is simplified with simultaneous measurements of SCI and SCE, and operators will be able to meet their customer colour requirements with less rework and wasted material. This makes the Ci7x00 an unparalleled tool for a wide range of industries.
Is there a future for pigment inks in textiles?
Since the mid-90s, research on digital textile printing has become more and more important. This application field offers the possibility of printing photographic-quality images with quick design time. A great advantage, especially for the fashion industry, is the ability to print-on-demand in small quantities down to a lot size of one. According to an analysis by the WTiN Intelligence: Digital Textiles, the worldwide output of digitally printed textiles is growing at an annual rate of approximately 20 per cent. Despite this rapid growth, the proportion of textile production that uses digital printing is only about 3-5 per cent up to now. One difficult criterion for effective industrial digital printing on textiles is the various number of different textile substrates ranging from natural such as cotton, wool or silk to synthetic materials like polyester and blended fabrics. All these fabric types require different types of inks and additional different needs for pre and post-treatment as well as processing. The ink types mainly used in industrial applications are reactive inks for natural fibres and sublimation/disperse inks for digital printing on polyester.
However, the ideal would be to have an ink suitable for all kinds of textile substrates. This request is to be fulfilled by the use of pigment inks. In this article, Zschimmer & Schwarz will describe the role of pigment inks for digital textile printing – do they have a real chance in the future or is it just a hype?
Pigment inks: Characteristics, application, and market
Rather than a dye that is soluble, water-based pigment inks use an insoluble pigment to provide coloration of the textile. Compared to dyes, the pigments do not have a real affinity for special fibres, which makes them suitable for colouring on the top layer of a various number of fibres as well as blends.
However, the global textile printing market (Fig.1) shows that pigment inks represent only about 3 per cent of inks used in digital textile printing. Inks most commonly used are still based on reactive, disperse and acid dyes. There are different reasons for the currentlow market share of pigment of pigment inks in digital textile printing. As previously mentioned, due to the top layer of printing by using a binder for better substrate adhesion, most pigment inks are limited when it comes to multiple-wash as well as rubfastness. Furthermore, the feel of the fabric is often stiffer than in reactive printing which is one of the main problems, especially in fashion or bed linen for example.
On the other hand, the use of pigment inks shows some remarkable benefits (Tab. 1). With the suitability of printing on a various number of textile substrates a broad field of application can be served, ranging from home textiles, soft signage and banners to fashion (mainly T-shirts) or speciality products. Pigments are especially beneficial in areas where high light-fastness is required. Furthermore, the entire process, compared to reactive prints, is very quick and easy.
Pigment versus reactive printing
As mentioned above, one benefit of using pigment inks in digital textile printing is the ease and length of the process. Fig. 2 schematically shows the process of printing with pigment inks compared to reactive inks. Due to their chemical characteristics, reactive dyes have to be bonded to the textile fibre after printing. Therefore, a steaming process of 8-12 minutes at 102°C (saturated steam) is necessary. Subsequently, the unbound dye has to be removed in a complex washing process (after treatment) at different temperatures ranging from about 50°C to 98°C, with soaping agent to 60°C, and finally 30°C (slightly acid). Then the printed textile has to be dried.
In comparison, the pigment printing process does not need the complex steaming and washing steps. Since the pigment dye is printed only on the top layer of the fabric without any chemical bonding, the textile fabric has to be condensed at 150-170°C for a few minutes to fix the pigments. Consequently, the pigment printing process requires significantly less water due to the omitted washing step. This may be a crucial deciding factor when deciding on whether to use digital pigment printing in the future.
Nevertheless, an additional point has to be mentioned regarding the printing process with pigment inks. Due to the insolubility of the pigment particles, the sedimentation of them could result in problems of nozzle clogging in the fine nozzles of inkjet printing machines.Therefore, to overcome this, two things should be noted: Firstly, all the inks have to be well stirred before using and secondly, the necessity of a print head with a circulating system becomes more and more important. The circulation provides a kind of continuous flow that avoids sedimentation and thus clogging the nozzles. In particular, the white pigment inks mostly based on the inorganic compound titanium dioxide need those circulating systems.
Inks exhibit a reliable printing performance, an easy handling, and cleaning, an outstanding light-fastness and can be processed according to the easy process described earlier. Furthermore, due to their chemical characteristics, it is possible to achieve very good rub-fastness values with these inks (Fig. 3, exemplified for cotton raw material). The dry rub-fastness values are in a range of 4-5 and the wet rub-fastness in a range of 3-4.
Additionally, investigations looking into multiple-wash have been done for cotton raw material by washing the printed and fixed textiles at 60°C for several times up to 25 times. Figures 4 and 5 illustrate the outstanding performance of Diamontex P HQ inks in case of multiple-wash. Any significant changes in the colour yield of the print could not be observed after up to 20 times of washing at 60°C. The average luminance is nearly stable in all basic colours. This colour stability is the basis for coloured printed motifs over several washes which can be seen in Figure 5.
Outlook
Pigment inks have the potential to have a big future in digital textile printing, especially when it comes to environmental aspects and process simplification.As well as being used on commonly used textile materials such as cotton, polyester, and polyamide, pigmented inks can also be used to easily print on mixed fabrics such as cotton-polyester blends where two different ink types are usually necessary. Moreover, the usage of Diamontex pigment inks opens up the possibility to print on specialised materials. Some tests have already been done on textile substrates that are usually difficult or almost impossible to digitally print on and these tests have had promising results.
Finally, pigment inks for digital textile printing have a great chance to prevail in the market for special material applications but also for the commonly used textile fibres when needing to save energy and water consumption.
By Andreas Schönfeld, Dr. Julia Ahrens, Dr. Nora
Wetzold, Peter Oehme, Oliver Richter from
Zschimmer & Schwarz digital printing team
Mouvent eyes to revolutionize India market with its digital textile innovations
Mouvent is a Swiss start-up company focused exclusively on delivering the future of digital printing using pioneering digital technology. Mouvent offers a fully integrated solution, developing, engineering, testing and industrializing digital printers based on the Mouvent™ Cluster Technology, a highly integrated cluster design arranged in a modular, scalable matrix. The company develops the controlling software, the inks and coatings, and provides a full service range.
For India, Mouvent identified Fortuna Colours & Prints LLP as key distributor for its digital textile printing solutions. Vinod Krishnamurthy, one of the co-founders of the company, started digital printing on textiles in 1998. The company launched Mimaki, Reggiani, Hong Hua, Kornit, Huntsman and almost a dozen brands, ranging from ink over software to machines.
“We were the first to set-up a center for textile printing, servicing the industry as nobody wanted to buy a 100,000 euro machine with 500 euro inks,” Krishnamurthy explains. “We printed for top designers in the country and we partnered with manufacturers before. But when we enter into a partnership, we want to share the responsibility for the service, support and ownership of the technology as we are not interested in box moving. This is one of the reasons why we jumped at the opportunity to organise sales and support for Mouvent in India.”
Mouvent has high expectations of the partnership. Ghislain Segard, Global Marketing and Sales Manager for textile machines at Mouvent, said, “We picked out India as one of our four key markets for the rich and long history of their textile industries. It is here, where innovations in textile printing are appreciated for their intrinsic worth, and we expect the Mouvent™ Cluster technology at the heart of our textile printing solutions such as the TX801 to catch on very quickly.”
The company recently participated in Gartex 2018, which took place from August 18-20 in New Delhi, India, where it showed for the first time in India their revolutionary digital inkjet textile printer TX801. Just as with similar high-profile tradeshows in China and Turkey, Mouvent’s innovative TX801 digital textile inkjet printer made heads turn at Gartex. The ultracompact TX801 prints with up to eight colours and, although it is a scanning type machine, can complete up to 50 per cent of the print jobs in a single pass, delivering top-of-the-bill productivity of 200 sq mtr/ hr without compromising on quality.
The reason why the TX801 drew so much attention is its use of the revolutionary MouventTM Cluster Technology which uses clusters instead of fixed size print bars by colour, arranged in a modular, scalable matrix. This results in one system that can be simply adapted to all substrates of all widths, for all markets. Its print quality is extremely high with an optical resolution of up to 2,000 dpi. The machine can process knitted, woven and non-woven textiles with a maximum fabric width of 1,820 mm with roll diameters of up to 400 mm.
“The TX801 showed how innovation guided by the needs of the market results in a pioneering product that delivers what that market has been waiting for,” said Segard. “The industry experts who saw the machine were delighted with its extremely high print quality that remains constant even at very high production speeds, as well as its precision and scalability. And we are very happy that companies will be able to immediately profit from the competitive advantage the TX801 is bound to deliver through our strategic partnership with Fortuna Colours & Prints LLP.”
“We are very happy that we can help Mouvent bring the TX801 to customers in India. The Indian textile market is extremely varied, interesting and rapidly changing, and the TX801 perfectly responds to the need for a very high quality, productive digital textile printer,” Krishnamurthy said. “It came as no surprise to us that the presentation of the machine was met with such enthusiasm. After all, the Indian textile production market consists of companies producing exclusive high-quality textiles as well as huge-scale mass-produced products. The solutions Mouvent can offer are very well-suited to this market.”
When asked if the company has set any target for India market, Vinod said, “We are not company driven with targets, and believe customers are our partner, so our aim is to get the right customer with a mind set to adopt our technologies. We want the technology to be understood, adapted and inspiring you to publicize to the Indian environment. So, currently we are not looking at no. but good establishment. We already have started to set up a showroom in India, and are still waiting for some other operations which need to be established so the customers can come and see the fabric getting printed through performance of the Mouvent printers.”
Talking about the sales and services they’ll be providing Vinod said, “So, we have a Mouvent service center based in Gurgaon which is dedicated to live demo and services. Here a client can come to do tests, understand the technology, so we are providing total solution. That’s one part. Secondly, all our engineers are well trained and continue to report and discuss with the Swiss service team. It’s like a Swiss support center where all the persons are being guided, supported and trained. We at Fortuna are there to manage the sales network. Service is a key part and it is something which keeps our technology up.”
Speaking about how Mouvent technology is different from others Ghislain Segard explained, “We don’t just sell any product but a new way to print with our technology, which has huge benefits. Our TX801 is an eight-colour multi-pass digital textile printer producing highest print quality on textiles with up to 2,000 DPI optical resolution at high printing speeds. We are able to print 200 sq mtr but our target is to provide an industrial single pass engine. Today, Mouvent is a new technology governed by a new market and we don’t want to sell it all over the world but to few selected countries. We have chosen few countries including Italy, Turkey, China and India, and before arriving to any country we make sure to have complete technical support and spare parts availability.”
Commenting on the digital printing market in India he said, “India being a textile hub, printing is very much needed. There has been a phase from certain speed of 20 sq mtr to speed of 200 sq mtr and more. Now, the speeds are going to jump more. More people will look into doing large projects, they need full support and I think the market is going to be very positive but how well the companies are going to adapt is going to be the challenge.”
“Confidence in the technology is the key driver. The company that gives the key technology buyer must have confidence that they are able to run that technology. That’s what the key is. That’s what our vision is. India will adapt digital in every segment like home textiles, fashion, label so digital is something you can’t ignore. Everybody will adapt it,” said Vinod.
Speaking about the response from the India market he said, “We are using a special head, and the technology built around a head gives us very good quality. Quality is very surprising for a lot of people who visited our stall. Those with printing experience will understand that it has excellent saturation of colours, which is a huge challenge when you want the rotary to shift into digital and that’s a very key point for us. So, I think people understand and when you see it’s a new technology and we are not expecting every second person to buy. There will be key players, key companies who will adapt to this technology and make a success story with us. Then eventually many will follow. But as far as product is concerned everybody is excited as they have never seen a technology like this.”
“Digital will be ahead in every market. Mouvent has already shown a new technology in Labelexpo, and Mouvent is going to come up in textiles, and packaging so you’ll find us in various segments. Mouvent will continue to develop a vast product portfolio for the different printing markets and roll out its products worldwide,” said Segard.
When asked about the future market prospects Vinod said, “I believe by 2025, there’s a good chance of 30 per cent jump which is huge by number in digital textile printing market share in India. As far as my company is concerned, I expect good percentage growth in next few years”
Zhejiang FZY Machinery foresees to become World’s No.1 rhinestone machines manufacturer
Zhejiang FZY Machinery Co.,Ltd is one of professional ultrasonic rhinestone hotfix machine manufacturer in the world. Established in 2007, and located at Xiaoshan District, Zhejiang Province, China, the company is involved in rhinestone hot-fix research and development, manufacturing and sales.
The company recently shifted to a bigger 7000 sq mtr factory where it employs around 30 people and has increased its production capacity by many fold.“Our machines are highly appraised by our customers for its low energy consumption, high efficiency, easy operation, high stability and high performance-price ratio. Various technical indexes give us a leading position compared with same industrial products. Our brand FZY is well known in the industry for being a complete rhinestone solution provider and now at this new plant we can make 6,000 machines per year in all different varieties including 16 different machinery models like rhinestone machine, pearl fixing machine and our new paperless rhinestone transfer machines etc.,” said Allen, Sales Head, Zhejiang FZY Machinery Co., Ltd while speaking exclusively to Apparel Views Editor Arvind Kumar, during his recent visit to China.
The company has recently launched a revolutionary Roll to roll technology of printing rhinestone without any film or paper, directly on the fabric. Speaking about the technology he said, “The machine saves a lot of labour, time and cost as it doesn’t require prior paper usage as the rhinestones are directly printed on the fabric. This machine is ideal for roll-to-roll fabrics and sarees, which require faster bulk production. It comes with two units, wherein the first unit puts the rhinestones on the fabric, and the second unit does fusing to fix the rhinestone permanently on it. So, ultimately, the new technology eliminates the one complete step in this procedure, which earlier used to require fixing the rhinestone on film and then transferring it on the fabric.”
Some of the benefits of the technology are: Ideal for roll-to-roll fabrics and sarees, transfer paper notrequired, save paper cost, fully automatic features, economical production, high production in less time (3,000-5,000 mtr/10 hrs.), low investment, low maintenance cost, less labour required, less space required, less power consumption. Other specifications of this technology include: Working power supply: AC220V 50 / 60Hz, Working Pressure: 0.5 MPa, Working width: 1450 mm, Max Fabric width: 1600 mm, Power consumption: 600W, Speed: 0-12M/min, Size of stone: SS10-SS20, Colour: Single, Overall Dimension: 1100 mm x 2000 mm x 1400 mm, Weight: 350kg.
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Very soon we are also going to launch Rhinestone Hotfix machine without air compressor. It’s a revolution for rhinestone, as for last 15 years single head rhinestone machines always needed air but this machine doesn’t require air. Its installation is also very easy. Even a person sitting at home can take order and start doing production. We have been working on it for last two years and finally it’s done. We’ve been doing some production testing in local market here and by October we will be ready with this machine,” he said.
While commenting on the market scenario in its major markets Allen said, “For last two-three months China market is not doing well,and everybody will be placing their new machines’ orders after Chinese New Year only, so things are expected to improve after that. Garment and textile is a traditional industry, and if you come out with something new, then there’s always a demand. In future our total sales will increase in both domestic and export markets.”
“Today our main overseas markets are India and Africa. For last one year Africa market is picking up except Egypt which is facing a lot of problems these days. India is going to be very important market for us in coming future. Especially West, North and South India markets are very good for us. In Western India Surat has very much potential because of huge production of sarees and dress materials. Demand for automatic rhinestone machines is increasing in this market because after rhinestone work sarees’ overall presentation improves with better look and shine at the same time adding value,” he said.
Adding to this Allen said, “Surat market is very similar to keqiao textile market in China, customers’ needs are similar in both these markets. We have sent 10 paperless roll to roll rhinestone printing machines to Surat for customers to do sampling and all of them have expressed their satisfaction over its performance as it gives very good production and saves a lot of money. They were very happy to see this machine and we have even started getting orders for which dispatching will be start by the end of this month.”
When asked about the quality control and after-sales-service of the machines in India he said, “Our machines quality is better than others available in the market. We have very good software engineers’ team, mechanical engineer team, research team which altogether make us best. Every year we spend more than 30 per cent investment in researching department. We strictly control the quality as all our newly launched machines are firstly tested in domestic market and then only sold in international markets. With business conceptions of quality, technology, service, we are doing better than our competitors in this segment. In our machines 60 per cent spare parts are made in house by us. Other standard spare parts are from Germany and Taiwan. We guarantee quality of our spare parts and especially ensure quality of critical parts.”
“In India, our agents and our own staff are taking care of machines after sales service.All electric parts can be repaired in Surat and have provided enough spare parts stock to our agents.We send our engineers three-four times a year in India for updating and changes in the machines. India market is very big with huge potential. But the labour force there is not very skilled. So,we make fully automatic machines at very low cost, which is a better option for them,” he said.
“When I see India, in factories some workers are very skilled. Embroidery work is very old so you have a lot of skilled people in this segment. But they too need little bit of training, to operate the machines. Due to scarcity of skilled labour force, in future automatic machines will be more in demand in India. These machines are not too costly and one can get return on investment in less than four months. With same workers and salaries one can increase its production,” said Allen.
Commenting on his future plans Allen said, “Today we manufacture 16 different machines at this new factory, and are planning to introduce 2-3 new models soon, which further will be increased to 20-25 models in next three years. Within half decade we foresee to become no. one in the world for rhinestone solutions. Rhinestone industry is not only limited to garments, it has jewellery, wallpaper and other segments also so we want to be at top in all these segments and make our production line wider.”
When asked about the current market scenario in India he said, “Dollar price increase has affected our machinery price for customers in India especially the domestic one as machine becomes expensive for them. India is one of our biggest markets today and in future we will mainly be focusing on the same. Especially targeting at the Surat market, we have certain concepts/changes for our machines keeping markets requirements in mind. As India is a very important for us so we are looking at spreading our business in all parts of the country including Mumbai, Delhi, Tirupur, Kolkata etc.”
FZY’s wide range of machines include LED Single disc rhinestone, LED Double disc rhinestone hotfix machine, LCD Single Disc Rhinestone Hotfix machine, LCD Display Disc Rhinestone Hotfix machine, Automatic lace rhinestone hotfix machine, Computerized rhinestone hotfix machine, Rhinestone Device, 6 colours rhinestone hotfix device, automatic roller rhinestone machine, semi-auto rhinestone transfer paper machine, Semi-auto double layer rhinestone transfer machine, Automatic rhinestone transfer paper machine, Automatic rhinestone heat fix machine, Nail stone modify machine, shape stone modify machine, Multi-function ultrasonic hot fix machine. Its rhinestone hot fix machine is suitable for various fabric such as velvet, polyester, silk, lace, jean, leather, etc.
Textile digital printing growth synonym with technological advancement
The growth of global digital textile printing market in 2018, which is almost 20 bn sqr. mtr in roll to roll print sector and with growth forecasts in the region of 20 per cent over the next few years, the three bn mtr by 2021 globally. The reason for the very high growth rates are well known – elimination of screens, cost effective for short-medium print runs, speed to market benefits, lower inventory, design flexibility and not the least many environmental advantages over analogue printing.
Digital advances in analogue printing technology
For some time now, the growth of inkjet technology for printing on textiles has stolen the limelight fromscreen and rotary printing technologies. There are many well-known reasons for this: Sustainability; design flexibility; and machinery footprint, to name only a few. However, analogue printing techniques still account for around 95 per cent of all fabric printed globally and countless print service providers have committed to a combined analogue and digital business model, choosing the most appropriate technology for each application. Analogue methods are here to stay, with rotary printing alone occupying around 65 per cent of the market. For screen print houses whose main advantage is cost, margins are tightly controlled, and this makes it difficult for printers to make the decision to invest in new technology, as capital investment into new machinery can be expensive. However, it often pays to adopt new technology where process efficiency gains can be made and print quality enhanced, thus bringing the printer new and regular business.
Factors enabling industrial digital textile printing
For many years there seemed no prospect of digital technology being usable for production of printed textiles in industrial quantities. Early in the new century, the introduction of a number of solutions showed the future direction for the industry: For the first time there were digital machines usable for production, high-quality proofing of new designs, but also the production of high-end, low-volume products such as silk scarves for the high-fashion market. The existence of such high-value, low-volume markets provided an outlet for digital technology, giving an introduction to textile mills of the potential advantages (and pitfalls) of the technology, while enabling inkjet system and component manufacturers to justify further investment in next- generation systems. This investment has led to a vast improvement in the capability of printing systems and inks, leading to the introduction of solutions since around 2010 that are able to rival conventional printing systems in quality, capability and increasingly in throughput and printing cost. In the next sections the developments that have enabled industrial digital textile printing, as well as those that will continue to enable performance and cost improvements over the next few years will be reviewed.
Future Inkjet Print Heads will influence industrial digital textile printing
The component at the heart of the printing system is the inkjet print heads, and development of improved print heads is a highly important factor enabling industrial printing. The major factors in print head performance are maximum jetting frequency, number of nozzles, drop volume, jetting straightness and uniformity, operating window and cost.
For many years piezo drop-on-demand (DOD) print heads have given the best compromise in speed, quality, robustness and range of ink types that can be used, and are used in almost all textile applications. Other possible technologies include continuous inkjet, which has been used in the past and maintains some interest, and thermal drop-on-demand, which may yet show some promise in textiles, for industrial applications.
The rise of digital textile machines to industrial applicability has entirely been dependent on one print head up to now – the Kyocera KJ4.The combination of high speed, aqueous compatibility, large nozzle count and greyscale capability with a suitable range of drop sizes for textileprinting meant that successful printers could be built around it. These range from scanning machines with one print head per colour, up to singlepass machines with several hundred print heads in total. However, due to the construction of the print head (and perhaps also due to its dominantmarket position) the head remains a high cost per nozzle component.Increasingly alternative print heads are becoming available to system manufacturers, often based on silicon (Si) MEMS (micro-electro-mechanical systems) construction that has become a popular approach to building industrial piezo print heads.
The advent of single-pass printer architectures has generated a need for print heads with higher nozzle counts, tighter packing densities and smaller drop sizes. This need for miniaturization fits well with precise feature size control inherent in the photolithographic and micromachining techniques used in MEMS processes. Silicon and silicon oxide provide excellent chemical compatibility with most ink families used in inkjet textile printing. Careful selection of upstream construction materials and bonding epoxies help to push the envelope for applications requiring compatibility with complex cross linking inks, functional materials and aggressive maintenance fluids. Finally, silicon MEMS manufacturing holds the promise of enjoying the economies of scale so important in the semiconductor industry. As the total number of units shipped grows and print head manufacturers learn how to take advantage of this, the high fixed cost of operating a MEMS fab can be spread across a larger number of units, lowering the per unit cost of manufacture (and potentially therefore the per nozzle cost of print heads when purchased by system manufacturers). It remains to be seen how rapidly, and with what effect, the adoption of Si-MEMS print heads will progress in the textile market, but it remains a very promising technology.
Inks
Inks have shown rapid advancement over the last few years, with further development required and are expected deliver all the possibilities required by textile printers. Reactive dye inks have shown advancements in colour performance and reliability, while sublimation inks have transformed the way textiles are decorated for sportswear and soft signage applications. An area requiring further development in order to truly tap into the potential of digital printing, particularly in-home furnishings, is the availability of pigmented inks with good colour, feel and fastness performance at a reasonable cost per metre. This is currently a significant gap in the market, but ink companies are developing technology in this area, and it is expected that further advances in performance, and reduction in cost, will occur over the next few years.
Software and electronics
Another important area is the printing software that manages the printing system and controls the supply of data to the print heads. Development of powerful and easy to use software is a significant factor in adoption of industrial printers, especially in a production environment like a textile mill. A good user interface allows easy access to the most important controls, while enabling more detailed changes to be made by qualified users.
Meanwhile, the image pipeline is responsible for converting an input image file into the data that determines when each nozzle fires as the textile isbeing printed. This involves a number of steps including colour management (to ensure the printed colours are as expected), screening (toreproduce continuous tonal variations in the best possible way using a matrix of dots), and splitting (deciding which data to send to each print head depending on the printer configuration). Single-pass systems again make huge demands on electronics and software to handle the large datathrough puts required and development in this area has been crucial to allow single pass systems to be successful.Textile-specific software is needed to handle textile design images.
Substrate handling and motion systems
Motion systems are required to move the substrate or print heads, or both, in order to scan the entire textile and produce the printed result. An industrial motion system for digital printing, no matter what the configuration, needs to have smoothness and consistency of motion, accuracy of positioning, handling of substrates to ensure dimensional stability during printing, and the suppression of vibrations that can lead to visible print art effects. There are a number of specific problems faced by motion system designers, as systematic errors in dot placement are highly visible to the human eye and generally undesirable. A combination of sound mechanical design and (in some cases) compensation for issues using software is required for optimum print quality. While promoting dimensional stability of textile substrates using ‘sticky rollers’ has been known for many years, the requirement and challenges are more testing for digital printing. The rotary screens in conventional printing act to hold the textile in place, while with inkjet the noncontact nature of the printing provides an additional challenge, which becomes ever more difficult as printing speeds increase. Again, significant development has been required to give good textile handling performance for production, and new and more difficult problems needed to be solved for single-pass systems.
Automated maintenance
As the nozzle/print head count in systems increases and the requirement for uptime in production limits the time available for nozzle maintenance, the need for fast, automated maintenance configurations becomes more pressing. In fact, in many large systems manual nozzle maintenance is simply impossible as many of them are inaccessible. Nozzles become compromised due to satellite ink and misting collecting on the print head faceplate, debris being trapped in non-printing nozzles, vibration leading to ink seepage, dust and fibres from the substrate and other contaminants from the printing environment, air bubbles either being drawn into the nozzle or in suspension in the ink, and ink drying in the nozzle. All of these can cause jetting to be compromised or stopped altogether. Many systems in production today in textile mills rely on manual nozzle maintenance, and the development of reliable and fast automated maintenance is a significant factor in the continued adoption of inkjet into production textile printing.
Ink supply
While often treated as a secondary item, the ink supply system that ensures the ink is delivered to the print heads is vital in ensuring reliability in an industrial production context. While simple in-principle, the ink supply is often a source of problems that can be extremely difficult to track down. The ink supply has to maintain the correct ink temperature, pressure and flow rate under varying external conditions, while also preventing particles and other contaminants from reaching the print head and avoiding chemical interaction and other reliability problems. Importantly, it also needs to be easy to use and refill under production conditions. Inks are complex chemical fluids with a wide range of possible constituents, including particulates and binder resins in the case of pigmented inks. This makes it difficult to find materials for the parts of the ink system in contact with the ink that will not interact with that ink chemically. Piping in scanning systems needs to be carefully designed to avoid pressure fluctuations that lead to banding in the printed result. It is only continued learning and development of ink supply systems and components that has allowed inkjet printing systems to gain sufficient reliability to be a realistic option for production textile printing.
Photographic quality through digital textile printing
With digital textile printing technology becoming more and more advanced, the complexity of the images that can be printed and the quality of the final outcome is becoming more sophisticated and impressive. Professional digital photography can now be successfully printed with an incredible photo quality on to textile surfaces, given the right technology, ink and substrate. The biggest benefit with digitally printed fabrics is the brilliant colours and that there is less reflection on the tensioned images, especially with backlit fabrics. However, although compared to the early days of digital textile printing, technology has reached a high-quality production level with printers now more reliable than ever and inks and software getting more advanced.
EFI Reggiani COLORS
EFI Reggiani COLORS is the new digital printer for Direct Printing on Fabric, available in 180, 240 and 340 cm printing width, that can reach a maximum speed over 370 linear meters/hour and expands EFI Reggiani Digital product range With up to 12 different colours in a row and 24 printing heads, EFI Reggiani COLORS will bring your creativity to the world in an explosion of colour.
Printer entry with Dynaplast, New printing chamber, Linear motor and magnetic encoder ensure precise and seamless printing head motion, while the stainless steel head plates grant longer life and superior protection to the printing heads, new ink recirculation system, capability to print up to 12 different colours in a row, extended colour gamut, by tailor made selection, each colour configuration will grant you specific, valuable benefits, New ink feeding system, continuous belt washing unit, real time print, Kyocera print head, EFI Go! App etc. In addition to above VOGUE, FLEXY well in the market and preferred by customers in 16 head & 8 head segment of industrial digital printing machine. Renoir PRO and TOP, Next, One and Compact is reigning in their respective segments.
Fabrics for PFDP
Fabrics for PFDP (prepared for digital print) are also engineered specifically for digital end user. So preparation of fabric for PFDP is an enigmatic area though a huge amount of progress happened but people have to understand that it’s different from PFP (prepared for printing).The chemicals for pretreatment should serve as an ink receptive layer, control capillary action, absorption, adsorption and agglomeration, once the low viscosity inkjet ink hits the textile surface.
Single pass printing
Single-pass printing systems, where the print heads remain stationary in a complete line across the textile roll and the substrate moves beneath them in a continuous manner, allow for greatly increased throughput from a single printing system. Singlepass printing systems have productivities that rival rotary screen systems for the first time, with the trade-off of greatly increased cost over scanning systems.
A potential issue with single pass printing is the fact that there is no opportunity to use interlacing of multiple print swathes, as is commonly used in scanning printers, to help in masking print defects. Another factor to consider is that with single pass printing there is no opportunity to perform nozzle spitting during a print run – a process that is commonly used in scanning printers to ensure all nozzles continue working correctly. These factors mean that single-pass print production is at a higher risk of rejection due to print defects, with the high printing speeds also meaning these print defects can extend over large areas before being recognised. For these reasons, single pass printing has not been adopted widely so far in production textile printing, with many textile mills choosing to addproductivity to their factories by ordering additional scanning machines rather than going down the single pass route. However, some of the largesttextile mills have been using single pass systems successfully for several years, and the introduction of new entrants into this market suggests that single pass systems may show larger market penetration from now on.
Selection of the right digital ink and fabric for your application
The complexities of choosing the right ink and fabric for your digital printing application, and how to get it right is most important. Choosing a digital textile printer for the new product; smart move, because digital printing offers the widest possible range of available fabrics, with no limitation on the number of colours or the size of repeat. However, choosing the right fabric for your application, and the ink type to go with it, can sometimes be a daunting prospect for a newcomer to the industry. It is even difficult for established print houses moving from analogue to digital printing as the chemistry and technology is quite different.
In addition to fabric construction, fibre composition determines the choice of ink, and the choice of ink determines the type of digital printing process that must be used, which in turn determines the resulting physical properties of your finished fabric. The Table provides details of various fibre types and the ink and digital processes that are needed to inkjet print on them.
It’s worth mentioning that all prospective digital textile printers are entering a new and growing realm of textile production. Digital printing offers amazing benefits where limitations of scale, number of colours and production delays are a thing of the past, and with digital textile printing giving a true improvement to Sustainability in textiles, it is definitely the technology of the future.
Just to outline, the global direct-to-garment (DTG) printing industry as well growing at a rapid pace driven by a Changing market. In the digital garment printing sector as well, new hybrid digital systems provide extremely soft hand print results. They are providing the combination of screen, digital, foil, flock and specialty inks all in one machine.
(By: Kishor Kumar Dash, Voltas Ltd.)
