Preparation and Characterisation of Ink Formulations Based on Sod. alginate and Natrosol as Thickeners for Jet Printing on Nylon Carpet

TO PREPARE and characterise various ink formulations for inkjet printing on nylon 66 carpet, various ink formulations were prepared using CI Acid Red 57, Natrosol and Sod. alginate thickeners, ethylene glycol, diethylene glycol, isopropanol with auxiliaries. The inks were characterised for their rheological, wetting and storage stability properties. The inks were jetted using a Printos P16 drop-on-demand jet printhead onto nylon 66 carpet materials. The printed images were characterised using an ImageXpert system. It was found that the inks containing the sod. alginate and natrosol thickeners at the optimum ratio gave good printing and image properties, such as optical density, drop size, and depth of penetration into the substrate at pH 45. The optimised ink formulation was found to have good storage stability. The study focused on ink formulations based on CI Acid Red 57. Ink formulations based on other colorants could also be studied in order to assess the applicability of the ink formulation system found for other colorants. The ink formulations developed could find use in industrial scale printing.