Benefits from today’s anilox rolls include dot gain reduction, improved color quality, and longer roll life

By Tom Polischuk

Dr. Lloyd Dreger, technical director, Laserlife—The anilox roll, the heart of the flexographic printing process, is one of the major contributors to improving printing quality. The trend to more engraved cells per given area on the anilox roll surface has reduced the amount of air trapped in the ink. A cone of ink forms from each cell at the interface of the anilox roll and the plate cylinder. More ink cones for a given surface area means less air between cones. Less air in the ink results in a reduction of dot gain giving the printer the ability to print sharper edges on solids and lower percentage of process dots when doing process printing.