Ink, a liquid containing a pigment or dye, which is used in writing or painting. With the wide use of printing and dyeing and inkjet technology, printing ink is the ink most be used. In textile printing, ink can be divided into several categories: pigment ink, thermal transfer ink, acid ink and reactive ink.

Thermal transfer ink

Thermal transfer ink, also known as dye sublimation ink. It is mainly used for heating products in transfer printing. Through heating the heat transfer machine, thermal transfer ink can make the pattern and text clearly on the other products. Compared with other inks,dye sublimaton inks deliver brilliant colour and good light fastness. After heat transfer, the image is clear and the color is bright. Designed for printing onto polyester substrates, these versatile inks will sublime onto polyester rich apparel fabrics, for example sports wear, carpet fabrics, sails and flagging material. Fabrics retain their natural handle, making this process ideal for garment sampling and also promotional banners. These printed fabrics are hardwearing and washable. Applying heat to the printed image with a press, whether through transfer paper or directly, fixes these vivid inks into the polyester substrate allowing the item to be washed time and time again.

Pigment ink

Relying on tiny coating particles in fiber surface to display colors, pigment ink has the convergence for different fabric. In another word, which is suitable for all kinds of fabrics. It is a kind of environmentally friendly ink, because he doesn't create floating color after fixation. It also has good light fastness, not easy to decomposed by light. Because of its coloring principle, even the particles in the outer layer of the molecule are decomposed by the light, the inner layer will keep the color.

However, pigment ink is completely insoluble in water, no affinity for the fiber, only color on the fiber surface, so its color performance is relatively poor.

Pigment printing has many shortcomings, but still has a very broad  development. Digital ink jet printing technology of coating is one of the key development on international green printing and dyeing technology, and has entered the stage of industrialization application.

Reactive ink

Actually is liquid reactive dye, widely used in digital printing applications. It has the advantages of wide adaptability, good color fastness, convenient use and so on. It can be used in the textile fiber, protein fiber and other fabrics at present.

This kind of dye contains the genes that can react with fiber, fiber response to dye when dyeing, covalent bond formed between the two,and they become a whole, enhancing the fastness to washing and rubbing.

Acid ink

A kind of water soluble ink with acidic groups on the structure, is dyed in acid medium. It is used to refer to the ink used in textile printing of cotton. The ink molecule structure is mainly used in the water absorption performance of the material and it is better for the material dyeing digital printing industry. It is suitable for printing silk, wool and nylon. The characteristics: high color saturation and high fixation rate, stable performance, safety of the nozzle, good compatibility of ink,color printing and good repeatability make  it widely be used.

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