Mara® Flex FX
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Technical Data Sheet Solvent-based Screen Printing Ink for the manufacturing of ID-Cards Suitable for laminating and embossing, offset-overprintable, satin ink film, very flexible Mara® Flex FX is a solvent based screen printing ink suitable for printing onto • PVC films • rigid PVC • extruded ABS blanks Since all the print substrates mentioned may have differing printability characteristics, even within an individual type, preliminary trials are essential to determine suitability for the intended use. Field of use Mara® Flex FX is suitable for printing on single and multi-layered identity cards such as customer loyalty cards, club cards, bank cards, telephone cards, smart cards, or ID system cards. FX excels through particularly good laminating characteristics. FX can also be used in combination with other printing methods such as waterless or UV offset as well as subsequent processing methods like press finishing. Attention: The colour shade FX 170 opaque white is not suited for laminating. Characteristics The FX colour shades are brilliant with medium opacity. This ensures excellent lamination (except for FX 170 opaque white) with high outputs and allows the mixing of very pure colour shades. Ink Adjustment Physically very fast drying; dries at 20°C ambient temperature within 10 min. ready for overprinting, at 50°C in a tunnel dryer (2 warm – 1 cold section) within 30 - 40 sec. The times mentioned above vary according to the substrate, the ink film thickness, drying conditions and the auxiliaries used. When overprinting the ink an extended drying time is necessary due to the solvent retention of the previously printed colour. When overprinting, an increased drying time is required due to the rewetting of the previous print layer. When printing both sides of cards, careful checks are necessary, so as to ensure adequate block resistance. Good final drying properties and a check for residual solvents in the printed ink film are essential for successful lamination, good overprintability, and high peel resistance. Here, “Wicket” dryers have proven to be most effective, due to the long dwell time of 10-20 min. in the tunnel. Too much residual solvent content in the ink generally degrades the laminating result. Fade resistance Pigments of excellent fade resistance (blue wool scale 6-8) are used for our ink series Mara® Flex FX. Stress resistance After proper and thorough drying, the ink film is very flexible and laminable. Furthermore, its surface is resistant to scratching and bending. Due to the gloss levels required for good offset overprintability, the dry abrasion and rub resistance properties are somewhat lower. Mara® Flex FX shows good resistance against alcohol and finger sweat. The ink should be stirred homogeneously before printing and if necessary during production. Marabu GmbH & Co. KG • Phone +49 7141 6910 • info@marabu-inks.com • www.marabu-inks.com

Technical Data Sheet Basic Shades Transparent Shades Press-Ready Metallics Further Products All shades are intermixable. Mixing with other ink types or auxiliaries must be avoided in or- der to maintain the special characteristics of this outstanding ink range. All basic shades are included in our Marabu- ColorFormulator (MCF). They build the basis for the calculation of individual colour match- ing formulas, as well as for shades of the com- mon colour reference systems HKS®, PAN- TONE®, and RAL®. All formulas are stored in the Marabu-Color Manager software. Due to the high amount of...

Technical Data Sheet Thinner, fast Thinner Cleaner (flp. 42°C) Cleaner (flp. 52°C) Cleaner (flp. 72°C) Retarder, fast Retarder, slow Thinner is added to the ink to adjust the printing viscosity. For slow printing sequences and fine motifs, it may be necessary to add retarder to the thinner (max. 1:1). To ensure good laminating characteristics, no other auxiliaries should be added to the FX. The cleaners UR 3 and UR 4 are recommended for manual cleaning of the working equipment. Cleaner UR 5 is recommended for manual or automatic cleaning of the working equipment. Printing Parameters All...