KONICA MINOLTA Colour Measurement for Recycled Materials Colour Measurement from Recyclates Inspection to Material Compounding, Processing and Final QC Giving Shape to Ideas

The plastic industry is experiencing a significant shift toward sustainability, driven by increasing global awareness of environmental challenges and regulatory pressures. One of the most impactful changes is the rising use of recycled materials in plastic production, enabling manufacturers to reduce their dependence on virgin polymers and minimise carbon footprints. This transition plays a pivotal role in advancing the principles of the circular economy, where resources are kept in use for as long as possible through recycling and reuse. By incorporating recycled content into new products, the...

Colour Measurement Incoming Material Control A benchtop spectrophotometer is used in a laboratory setting to measure and document the colour of incoming recycled plastic flakes or pellets. By capturing precise spectral data, quality teams can compare the colour profile of recyclates against reference standards, enabling them to sort or pre-process material batches based on colour consistency. This ensures that only recyclates within acceptable colour tolerances enter production, reducing downstream colour variation and improving efficiency. Matching Recycled Blends Computer Colour Matching (CCM)...

COLOUR MATCHING Konica Minolta's Colour Matching Software offers a versatile and adaptive solution for industrial-grade colour formulation and correction, optimised for complex materials ranging from opaque plastics to translucent and transparent polymers. Leveraging a powerful algorithm tightly integrated with Konica Minolta spectrophotometers, the software delivers reliable, high-precision matching even for challenging scenarios such as highly saturated or dark colours within seconds. By simultaneously calculating colour and opacity, it helps prevent over-pigmentation ensuring that pigment...

When introducing or increasing the percentage of recycled material, typically increased focus and control over the colour is required. Incorporating recyclates introduces variability in base colour due to differences in feedstock and processing history, often resulting in grey or yellowish hues compared to virgin polymers. Traditionally, achieving a specific colour required adding greater amounts of pigment or even reducing the recycled content, which increased costs and limited sustainability goals. By implementing Colour Computer Matching (CCM) software linked to a spectrophotometer, the manufacturer...

The CM-36dG and CM-36dGV spectrophotometers are high-precision colour measurement instruments especially well-suited for recycled PET (rPET) bottle applications, where accurate colour evaluation in both reflection and transmission is used for maintaining quality and brand consistency. These instruments combine reflectance colour measurement with an integrated ISO 2813 compliant 60° gloss sensor, allowing simultaneous colour and gloss evaluation. This is essential for recycled PET bottle preforms, caps, and closures, where surface characteristics and gloss variations can influence perceived colour....

"State of the Art" spectrophotometer for maximum performance, even for the darkest colours The flagship spectrophotometer from Konica Minolta Sensing, built without compromise. The CM-3700A Plus offers the highest levels of accuracy, repeatability and inter-instrument agreement. Ideally suited to high- demanding applications like colour matching, or for specification of colour to aglobal supply chain. Users can measure colour in reflectance and transmittance, for solid as well as liquid samples. The sample viewer camera in the CM-3700A Plus assures that even small or patterned samples can be...

Portable Spectrophotometer CM-17dErgonomic solution for measuring the colour of small, curved and patterned samples The CM-17d is a vertically oriented portable spectrophotometer with user-switchable measuring aperture (3mm /8mm), an ideal solution for the colour measurement of many plastic products, and especially for small, curved or patterned samples. The device has a simple interface and a large colour display that makes it easy to use, and an integrated sample viewfinder camera that ensures precise measurement, even on tricky or patterned samples. Operators can be confident in measured data...

The CM-26dG series is a portable d:8° spectrophotometer with a built-in ISO-compliant 60° gloss sensor. Its updated controls, integrated display, and sample viewing port simplify operation and allow quick, accurate colour evaluation directly at production lines or in quality control laboratories. Designed with advanced digital colour management features, the CM-26dG ensures traceable colour measurement across multiple sites and users. It is supplied as a close-tolerance instrument as standard, providing the precision needed to manage variability in recycled feedstocks and their blends with virgin...

Konica Minolta instruments use the new SpectraMagic” NX2 software, developed to provide a modern, intuitive and comprehensive software solution for measuring and communicating colour data. SpectraMagic” NX2 integrates the operator's visual judgement into colour approvals, offers increased versatility for custom equations, user data and data tagging. The new QC model feature enables better centralisation and administration of references within companies and between supply chain partners by including conditions, tolerances and configurations with colour references. Administrators can define different...

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