Printed decorative paper is a kind of paper that is printed with different kinds of designs like wood grain, marble, textile, or other patterns of various tree species through the image reproduction or artificial methods, and uses printing cylinders and color matching technology to print these patterns. . It is the surface paper in the furniture structure, and mainly plays the role of providing decorative patterns and preventing the glue seepage of the bottom layer. The decorative performance of the furniture is mainly decided by the procedure of printing. Today we will talk about how to print decorative paper for furniture.
To print the decorative paper, there are 4 procedures in total：
1. Prepare the raw material paper.
Plain base paper is usually used as the raw material paper for printed decorative paper. This paper is made of premium wood pulp and titanium dioxide. The weight is from 50gsm to 100gsm and the width is from 950mm to 2100mm. The most popular type for furniture panel is 70gsm and 80gsm. Width 1250mm is mostly used in Asian countries. 1830mm and 2100mm is common in Europe. According to the darkness of the furniture designs, the base paper has many kinds of colors. If the design is light, white base paper or egg white base paper will be the first choice. If the color is deep, a dark color like brown, grey may be a good option.
To make a high-grade decor paper for furniture, the quality of the base paper is very important. Excellent opacity can improve the coverage of the wood panel. Uniform weight can assure the melamine resin is well absorbed by the wooden décor paper. High light fastness and pure chroma can ensure the reproducibility of printed patterns. Sufficient wet strength can keep the stability of the printing work and impregnation operation. Full dry strength can guarantee the rolling procedure and printing works.
In the current Chinese base paper market, king decor is the best base paper brand. Qifeng is also a big plain paper manufacturer. They are both our partners.
2. Engraving the printing cylinder
Printing one decorative pattern requires 1-5 plate cylinders. The cylinder numbers are decided by how many colors that a pattern has. Generally, the simple the design, the less the cylinder. For example, the solid color just needs one cylinder and some simple stripe or wave patterns only need 2 plate rollers, but some complex wood grains or abstract patterns may need 5 cylinders. In most cases, normal furniture decorative paper patterns like oak, teak, walnut, or other wooden grain use 3 cylinders.
The cylinder is embossed with a shallow or deep design. All the plate rollers are overlapped together to form a pattern. When the customer wants to make one décor paper design for furniture, they usually need to offer 2-3 meters decorative paper sample for the plate factory to design and engrave the cylinder.
3. Using printing ink to match color
One decorative paper pattern can have many different colors. That is why we need to match colors before making the furniture decorative paper. For example, a wood grain pattern may have many colors from white to dark or from light to deep. Some people like light color and some prefer deep type. Sometimes, in the home decoration field, many furniture designers also like to use the light and deep colors of the same pattern to design a wardrobe and cabinet. This light and deep combination can make the room looks more bright and comfortable.
Because of the environmental friendly features, Water-based inks are the choice of most decorative paper factories. The basic ink colors are red, yellow, blue, and dark. The colorist uses these colors to mix into many different colors, then combines 1-5 of them (according to the cylinder number) to form a decorative paper color. VIIKAN printed decorative paper mainly use 2 ink brand – Hartmann ink and Great World ink. Before mass production, the colorist needs to match the color according to the customer’s sample paper. Only when the color is matched the same, we go to the next printing procedure.
4. Manufacturing by Printing Machine
After preparing the raw material, the next step is to put the base paper, ink, and cylinder onto the printing line to start manufacturing. The base paper will get through the 1-5 inking and drying process to form the preset décor paper pattern. In general, one color means one inking and drying process. After the last drying, it will be packed in roll to finish the printing procedure.
This step is the most important procedure because it determines the final decorative paper effect. The quality problem such as missing print, wrinkle, blade streaks, misregister is all caused by this link. VIIKAN uses MEIGE high-speed automatic gravure printing machine to produce decorative paper. All the pattern matching is done by the computer. It can avoid a lot of quality problems and improve production efficiency.
5. Re-rolling to check the quality
To ensure quality, decorative paper manufacturers usually use a single rewinder to do the quality inspection. When it is no quality problem, the paper will be packed into decorative paper roll to send to the next procedure for impregnation. If it is for sales, the workers will pack it as the customer’s requirement and wait for delivery. For example, the decorative paper wholesaler usually requires to pack the paper in 250kg per roll. It will be convenient for them to sell the paper to small laminate factories. Meanwhile, for the decorative paper end users, they usually like 500kg per roll because it will reduce a lot of waste.
If you want to know more information about decorative paper production, please contact us or visit our factory. You will see not only a complete decor paper printing process but also know how the decor paper is used to make the furniture. Warmly welcome you visit our factory at any time!
