Pigments Manufacturers in India: March 2019

Saturday 23 March 2019

Textile printing and its advantages

Textiles, a basic human need has always been a hotspot for innovation. A major modern concern of producers as well as environment groups has been the fact that textile coloring processes involve dyes. The discharge processes have a damaging effect on the environment and involve consumption of large volumes of water. Furthermore, they are toxic to human health.
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Acting on these concerns, Qualitron is pioneering printing technologies that are free of dyes and discharge processes without compromising the feel and fastness standards typical of dyed prints.

Epricon – Pigment Based Solutions for Reactive replacement

Reactive printing has been the mainstay of coloring fabrics due to the exceptional depth, feel and fastness properties imparted. It involves using dying agents, chromophoric molecules with reactive groups, that react permanently to the fabric. Reactive printing does not come without drawbacks though. Reactive dyes require alkaline fixation baths consuming large quantities of water yet do not fully fix resulting in generation of excess dye contaminated water and dye wastage. Further, the final color development cannot be ascertained until the fabric undergoes post processing thus essentially printing “blind”.

Pigment printing on the other hand involves fixing pigments onto the fabric using polymeric binders. The process involves preparing pigment pastes consisting of pigments, binder, thickeners and certain enhancing additives. This paste is then printed onto the fabrics and cured. There are no post processing steps and the water consumption is minimized to paste preparation and evaporated away during curing. There is no effluent stream generated unlike reactive dying.

There have been several attempts to replace reactive printing with pigment based solutions but the challenge of obtaining feel and fastness standards still remains. Qualitron Chemicals, through its Epricon package, has successfully overcome these hurdles in pigment printing. With wet rub and wash standards like reactive and zero hand feel, Qualitron is enabling a shift for printers to move towards zero water discharge printing processes without compromising on print quality. Our rotary grade ready white inks are designed for highest opacity and hand feel standards allowing for replacement of discharge printing eliminating water usage involved.

K2 Inks – PVC-free Water Based Garment Printing Inks

Textile pigment ink

Qualitron Chemicals & Pigments is a global pioneer in the shift away from PVC Plastisol based screen printing ink towards water-based technology. With increasing environmental and health concerns around the usage of PVC and plasticizers, there was a need to shift towards more eco-friendly and non-toxic platforms which called for the usage of PVC free inks . With K2 series of water based printing ink, qualitron enables manual and machine printing with the runnability and ease of plastisol and excellent hand feel and fastness standards. Typical inks compromise between hand feel and wet rub standards. Qualitron polymer technology allows maximum wet rub standards without losing the hand feel allowing deep color printing with excellent durability.

Textile Dyes & Pigments

Wednesday 6 March 2019

How Are Colours Seen by Us?

Colour infuses life and vitality to every day materials and makes them attractive and appealing. The natural burst of colourful flowers and varied hues of green in summer to the contrasting shades of orange and yellow in autumn, the colour in nature makes impressionable prints on our mind. How do we perceive colour? We hardly give it a thought!

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Molecules which are naturally occurring easily absorb distinctive and specific wavelengths and reflect colour that is not absorbed by them. The colour that is reflected by them into the environment is viewed as the colour as seen by the human eye. For example:
• Carrots, pumpkins and squash is seen as orange in colour due to the presence of ‘beta-carotene’. This biochemical absorbs blue light and reflects orange which it does not absorb.
• Tomatoes are viewed as bright reds because the lycopene in them takes in green light and reflects red wavelengths into the atmosphere.
• Chlorophyll in plants absorbs red and blue wavelengths of light and reflects green light back to us.
The colour that is visible to the human eye is basically what is not absorbed by the organic molecule.

Dyes and Pigments- Classified
In this context, pigments can be defined as material that changes the colour of transmitted light due to the selective absorption of wavelengths. Both pigments and dyes are seen as coloured items because of the greater absorption of some wavelengths over the others. Dyes and pigments are often classified based on particular groups of atoms present in their molecular structures. Dyes are also classified based on the way they work or the manner in which they are used. For example; reactive dyes are named such as they react with the material they are supposed to colour by developing covalent bonds with it. On the other hand direct dyes are used directly from a sodium salt bath. Textile dyes are named such as they are the ones which add colour to yarns, fibres and fabrics. Acid dyes are those dyes that are applied from acidic dye baths.
Another classification of coloured chemicals is the organic and inorganic dyes and pigments. Pigments are available in solid form whereas dyes are referred to as coloured liquids. Sometimes there is a combination of organic pigments with inorganic substances and the resultant are ‘lakes’. The resultant product becomes insoluble in water and this ensures that the colour does not rub off onto human skin when used for candy and pill coatings. Organic pigments can be naturally occurring or they can be synthetic organic pigments. Among the synthetic organic pigments about 25% are the phthalocyanine pigments

Application of Dyes and Pigments

Dyes—coloring materials that are applied as a solution and cling to whatever they are applied to (e.g., textiles, hair, wood, food)—can be used for decorative, aesthetic, and artistic purposes. They can also be used as identifiers, like the purple dye that some countries use to mark voters' fingers during an election or the wool dyes that sheep herders use to mark the sheep in their flocks. Fluorescent brightening dyes improve the appearance of textiles and paper. Contrast agents and fluorescent dyes make selected cells and organs stand out for biological and medical imaging. Dye-based lasers are not only powerful, but they also emit laser light over a range of wavelengths, producing "tunable" laser beams for manufacturing, medical applications, astronomical research, and spectroscopy. Dye laser beams can even be used to vaporize tattoo inks.

Pigments are used for artists' paints, car finishes, and light-reflecting signs. They are insoluble materials that have to be mixed with binders or vehicles to attach them to a substrate. Pigments are often derived from minerals, but they can also be made synthetically. Pigments are used in paints, inks, plastics, fabrics, cosmetics, and food, to name a few examples. They are often better than dyes at keeping their color for many centuries and for withstanding high heat, intense light, and exposure to weather or chemical agents.
Today the role and application of pigments have increased manifolds. There would hardly be any industries left where Pigments do not play any substantial role. The challenge is now to discover pigments that are capable of not only long-lasting applications but also are environmentally safe.

A few of the important applications of Pigments is given below.

Paints- A diversified application in the whole gamut of paints that include decorative and protective coatings, in paints that are oil and resin based, automotive finishes, emulsion paints, distempers, aqueous based paints like lime etc.

Printing inks- Pigments are used in all kinds of printing inks, that includes inks for printing metal foils, lacquers etc.

Pigment finishes for leather and textiles: Coloration application for popular textiles such as polyesters, nylon etc.

Colouration of Plastics- Pigments are used in host of plastic applications that includes poly vinyl chloride(PVC), rubber and synthetic polymers, urea-formaldehyde(U-F) and melamine-formaldehyde moulding powders polystyrene, nylons, polyfins, phenol-formaldehyde(P-F), acrylonitrile-butadiene-styrene resins (ABS).

Colouratuon of cement glass paints

Colours for cosmetics

Colouration for papers

Pigment Definition & Classification

Pigments are colored, black, white or fluorescent particulate organic or inorganic solids which usually are insoluble in, and essentially physically and chemically unaffected by, the vehicle or substrate in which they are incorporated. They alter appearance by selective absorption and/or by scattering of light. Pigments are usually dispersed in vehicles or substrates for application, as for instance in the manufacture or inks, paints, plastics or other polymeric materials. Pigments retain a crystal or particulate structure throughout the coloration process.-defined by CPMA (The Color Pigments Manufacturers Association, Inc.) phthalocyanine pigments manufacturers in india

Dyes are intensely colored or fluorescent organic substances only, which impart color to a substrate by selective absorption of light. They are soluble and/or go through an application process which, at least temporarily, destroys any crystal structure by absorption, solution, and mechanical retention, or by ionic or covalent chemical bonds.—defined by ETAD (The Ecological and Toxicological Association of Dyes and Organic Pigment Manufacturers). Both are of categories of colorant which definition is a substance used for coloring a material, sometimes also called coloration matter or coloring matter

Difference Between Organic and Inorganic Pigments
Compared with organic pigments, inorganic pigments have lower cost, simple production process and higher yield than organic pigments. also excellent light resistance, heat resistance, and weatherability. Inorganic pigment is suitable for architectural coatings, glass, ceramics, rubber, and plastics coloring.

Key features and characteristics of Organic Pigments

Very good stability to solvents, light, heat, and weathering
Good tinctorial strength
Cost effectiveness
Consistency and unique shades
Completely non-toxic
Very bright, pure, rich colors
Organic pigments shows good color strength