Sales of DB-Automation’s unique hot foil printing (stamping) equipment have grown after it shipped two machines to a US multinational packaging company.
DB-Automation are a Leicestershire based company, specialising in the design and manufacture of bespoke high-speed injection moulding automation.
This growth can be directly attributed to some major technological advances, developed as part of the DB policy of achieving ‘automation excellence’.
These latest two-colour units will be used for the decoration of Xbox One game cases, with the application of both white lettering and a real metallic logo. In this instance, the foil is applied to raised lettering produced during the moulding process, but it can also be applied directly to a flat substrate.
Hot foil printing DB automation
A hot foil process has following advantages over paints and inks:
Real metallic finishes can be achieved; Foil can be applied directly to materials such as PP, no ‘key’ or primer needed; Very consistent colour density; No curing process needed; Greater wear resistance, making it ideal for marking sterilised medical containers where information is critical.
Greater Productivity. The highly automated nature and design of the DB-Automation solution provides a typical cycle time of 45 parts per minute, even with this 2-stage/colour application. This compares to industry typical speeds of 25 parts per minute.
Minimal Wastage. The foil used on each station is fed from reel to reel. DB’s solution uses a DOUBLE motorised feed system that always delivers a set increment of correctly tensioned foil. This negates the traditional issue of the gap between each stamping increasing as the diameter of the take-off reel increases.
Superior Quality. The combination of their servo-conveyor delivery system and fully adjustable print head (in terms of positioning accuracy, temperature control and application pressure), provides superior results and minimises reject levels.
The DB system also delivers all printed components to an integrated vision system. This continually monitors quality levels, any suspect components being automatically removed from the process and quarantined, without interrupting production.