ECOBRITE® organic inks have an in situ adhesion promoter that eliminates the need for silane pretreatment and makes printing colorful glass bottles and containers easier.
The new formulation from PPG Industries’ performance glass coatings group is designed primarily for returnable and dishwasher-safe bottles and containers. EcoBrite inks now chemically couple and adhere to glass during the printing process. Prior to this development, the application of EcoBrite inks required glassware to be pretreated with a silane-coupling agent to facilitate a glass-ink bond strong enough to survive continuous cleaning and/or processing.
The new EcoBrite ink formulation also makes it easier to print multiple inks using wet-on-wet screen printing because it combines with patented PPG spacer particle technology to reduce screen pick-off and smearing issues associated with less-advanced thermally-cured organic screen-printing inks.
Other advantages include less stickiness at room temperature to reduce cleanup and handling difficulties, and lower curing temperatures compared to ceramic glass-printing inks.
These inks are available in a brilliant spectrum of colors – including fluorescent, metallic, phosphorescent and thermochromic – using an epoxy-based formula that contains no heavy metals. As a result, the inks comply with environmental regulations such as Proposition 65 in California and the Coalition of Northeastern Governors Legislation (CONEG) “Toxics in Packaging,” which is being adopted throughout the United States.
