At Hemtextil, ColorJet displayed a 4-color eco-friendly digital textile printer with speeds up to 24 square meter per hour and a sublimation machine for all polyester materials. The company converted its stand to a complete home environment by putting products like bedsheets, curtains, pillow covers, etc. on display.
The digital textile printer, TXF, is a direct-to-fabric printer based on Japanese technology. “The machine was launched at Fespa 2017 that took place in Hamburg from 8 to 12 May where we got a huge response from customers from the UK, Spain, Italy and Portugal,” shares Smarth Bansal, senior product manager at ColorJet India. “The TXF is not a high-speed machine but a good entry-level machine. It is the perfect product for home furnishing designers wanting to do sampling but not willing to share their designs with the market out of the fear of having their samples copied. So, this is a machine for in-house sampling and that is the whole concept we have built here.”
Equipped with Epson printheads, the TXF can print on all types of fabrics, including polyester, cotton, silk, viscose, rayon or wool. This has been made possible since the printer is apt for printing with pigment ink, which opens up huge avenues for different home textile applications. The TXF is also available to work with reactive inks for printing on natural fabrics and can disperse inks for printing on polyester fabrics. The printer can achieve print resolutions of up to 1,440 dpi.
According to Bansal, pigment is the only ink which works well with both natural (e.g., cotton) and synthetic fabric (e.g., polyester). “With pigment ink, the technology is very simple,” Bansal says. “All you have to do is put the roll in the machine and give the print command. After a certain temperature of curing of the fabric, say 160 to 180 degree Celsius, the fabric is ready to be used and can be even washed.”
Speaking about the Hemtextil exhibition, Bansal shares, “Hemtextil is an international exhibition. The overall quality of the exhibition is very nice but this year we saw a drop in the footfall, which may have been due to the exhibition happening on weekdays; it could be also due to the rain during the last two days of the exhibition.” ColorJet will next participate in Media Expo Delhi from 22 to 24 September 2017.
