Hexion Specialty Chemicals Launches Three New UV-Curable Inkjet Inks

Hexion Specialty Chemicals introduced three new UV-curable ink sets for inkjet printing applications. The new inks are tailored to provide superior end user properties such as adhesion to difficult substrates, high flexibility and low-dose curing.
    
Hexion’s new HexiLok inkjet ink is a UV-curable ink that provides excellent adherence to particularly problematic printing substrates such as glass, ceramics, and metals. This CMYK ink set product can be used for applications such as decorative glass or ceramic tile printing as well as automotive metal parts and coatings.
    
The company’s new HexiFlex inkjet ink is a UV-curable ink that can extend greater than 200 percent. This product is particularly suited for fleet graphics, where its high elongation eliminates cracking on corrugated vehicle panels and around rivets. It also is well suited to applications such as thermoforming. HexiFlex inkjet inks provide excellent adhesion on rigid and flexible PVC, polycarbonate, polyester, glass, aluminum, or stainless-steel substrates.
    
For applications that require low-dose curing, Hexion has developed FlashCure inkjet ink. This CMYK ink set is a UV-curable ink that requires a dose of less than 20 mJ/cm2 for pinning (freezing the ink drop on the substrate) and is fully cured with less than 150 mJ/cm2. These inks were designed primarily for heat-sensitive substrates or high speed printing applications. Curing with a lower energy dose means that much thinner, rigid materials can be used without concerns of the substrate warping in the printer.
    
“We are excited about these new products and the benefits they offer the industry,” said business development manager Paul Lindquist. “We continue to enable the digital print market with fresh ink solutions that are focused on satisfying the customer’s most demanding needs.”