Page 118 - Training 2019

Anilox Scoring

A couple of years later, I received an email from a new manager at the same plant. Their
anilox rolls were still being scored and he asked me for suggestions. I sent him my
presentation and report. Chagrined, he confirmed that, besides not addressing the
potential sources of contamination we had identified, they were still not filtering the ink in-
line. Why does this happen? I'll guess at two main factors: folks are not convinced that
they should filter their ink in-line and change takes persistent effort. If scored anilox rolls
and their consequences are not enough incentive to compel someone to push through the
effort required to prevent scoring, they cannot be helped. Happy scoring to them.
However, if they just didn't realize that in-line ink filtration is one of the most effective
ways to remove hard particles suspended in their ink and reduce the incidence of anilox
scoring, there's hope. The hard particles that score the surfaces of anilox rolls can be
sand, grit, or dust brought in under shoes. They can be blown in through dock doors,
transferred from cleaning tanks or recycled rags, or distributed on forklift wheels. They can
be ferrous or non-ferrous metallic bits, from doctor blade or other equipment wear. They
can stow away in solvent containers and be poured into ink or travel through galvanized
pipes from supply tanks directly into ink sumps. They can be incompletely milled pigments
or tiny ceramic chips from anilox roll ends or come from any of a number of other possible
sources. In the end, though, its hard particles wedged under doctor blades that do the evil
deeds. These offensive little particles are persistent, too. No matter how careful we are
about keeping them out of our ink, some of them will find their way into it. Therefore,
aside from taking precautions avoid contamination; the most effective thing we can do to
prevent scoring is to filter the ink in-line.

INK FILTERS TRAINING MANUAL 6
Updated - 24 June 2019