ADVANCING EDGE BANDING – AGFA’S UV INKJET INK SOLUTION

Edge banding is a crucial process in furniture manufacturing. It enhances both the durability and aesthetic appeal of finished products. 
By covering the exposed sides of materials – such as plywood, MDF and particleboard – with edge bands, manufacturers can create furniture that is more resistant to moisture, scratches and wear. Edge bands can be made of materials including ABS, PP, PVC, melamine or wood veneer. 

Achieving visual harmony between the edge band and the furniture panels presents a significant challenge. This is especially true when reproducing intricate wood-grain designs. Agfa’s innovative UV-curable inkjet inks address this with impressive material adaptability and high-precision detail reproduction. As a result, a perfect match is achievable and new standards are set for quality and consistency in edge-band printing.

Agfa’s inkjet inks seamlessly integrate into the furniture design lifecycle with impressive efficiency and quality. In particular, the Altamira Design printed interior decoration (PID) set patented technology specifically designed for wood-grain printing. This advanced ink set consists of cyan, magenta, yellow, black and the wood-specific wood yellow, and wood red inks. The Altamira Design PID set delivers consistent colour reproduction. Consequently, it effectively addresses challenges such as metamerism and colour inconsistency under varying lighting conditions. Compliant with IKEA’s IOS-MAT-207 regulation, the inks meet stringent environmental and safety standards, supporting sustainable production and responsible material use. With high indoor lightfastness, they guarantee long-lasting, vibrant colours in any setting.

Metamerism and colour constancy are two critical factors in ensuring the aesthetic success of furniture and interior decoration.

Metamerism refers to the phenomenon where two colours appear identical under one lighting condition, but differ under another. For example, an edge band may appear to be an exact match to a furniture panel in natural daylight, but seem mismatched under artificial lighting. This discrepancy arises because different materials or inks reflect light in unique ways and their spectral characteristics interact in other ways with different light sources.

A key feature of the Altamira Design PID ink set is its innovative use of mixed pigments. Unlike traditional, single-pigment formulations, this approach combines multiple pigments to enhance the ink’s ability to reproduce the complex and subtle tones found in natural wood grains. By carefully selecting and balancing pigments, the ink achieves a wide colour gamut, exceptional depth and rich tonal accuracy. 

This method also reduces metamerism, ensuring that the colours remain consistent under different lighting conditions. The mixed pigments allow for better reproduction of natural wood colours, capturing the subtle variations in hue and depth that are often difficult to replicate. Additionally, the balance of pigments helps reduce colour shifts over time, ensuring that the printed designs maintain their visual consistency.

Colour constancy, on the other hand, describes the perceived stability of a single colour across various lighting conditions. 
It is the ability of the human visual system to compensate for changes in illumination, maintaining the apparent colour of objects. For instance, a wood grain design on an edge band should appear the same whether viewed in warm indoor lighting or cooler daylight.

“The Altamira Design PID set delivers consistent colour reproduction”

In interior design, both phenomena play a crucial role in creating harmonious spaces. Furniture often interacts with a variety of light sources, such as natural sunlight, LED lighting or incandescent bulbs, throughout the day. If the edge banding on furniture exhibits noticeable shifts in colour – or fails to align with other surfaces – it can disrupt the overall aesthetic balance of a room. This is particularly critical in high-end furniture or custom interiors, where attention to detail and quality are paramount.

Agfa’s Altamira Design PID ink set is engineered to address these challenges. Advanced pigment mixtures are leveraged and spectral properties carefully balanced. Because of this, the inks significantly reduce metamerism, enhance colour constancy and deliver a full-colour gamut for wood-grain designs. This ensures that edge bands not only match furniture panels under a wide range of lighting conditions, but also maintain their visual integrity over time. For designers and manufacturers, this translates to greater customer satisfaction and fewer costly adjustments or returns.

The Altamira Design PID ink set – comprising specially formulated yellow and red inks – is engineered to reduce colour inconsistency and metamerism. The set delivers superior colour consistency, especially when paired with the advanced bulk-colouration technique of substrates and coloured primers used in the printing process. The combination of these technologies ensures that the ink adheres to the substrate more effectively and results in more accurate colour reproduction. This further lowers both metamerism index (MI) and colour inconstancy (CI).

One of the primary goals in edge-band printing is to minimise CI. This is the degree to which the colour of the edge band varies under different lighting conditions. The Design PID ink set delivers a notably lower CI value. In other words, it leads to less colour variation in the edge-band print, regardless of the type of lighting. This approach ensures that the edge band matches the furniture panel more consistently across various lighting scenarios. As a result, a high level of visual harmony is achieved and issues that could arise from mismatched colours are prevented (see Figure 1).

Metamerism is a particularly challenging issue when printing edge bands. It results in visible colour shifts between the edge band and the furniture panel when viewed under different light sources. The Design PID ink set is formulated to significantly reduce metamerism, ensuring that the edge band matches the top surface much more accurately. This applies whether it is gravure or inkjet printed. The result is a more consistent visual appearance, preventing the edge band from appearing mismatched under different lighting (see Figure 2).

To further enhance the performance of the Design PID inks, it is recommended to use in-bulk-coloured substrates combined with a coloured primer. This additional step helps lower both the CI and MI values even further and optimises the visual harmony between the edge band and the furniture panel. The use of the coloured primer allows the inks to perform better on different substrates. It can achieve more vibrant colours and reduce the likelihood of colour shifts or inconsistencies. The combination of in-bulk-coloured substrates and the Altamira Design PID ink set ensures that the edge bands look natural. Furthermore, they retain their visual integrity over time and under various lighting conditions. This approach also optimises ink usage, reducing overall consumption and costs (see Figure 3).

In summary, Agfa’s Altamira Design PID ink set consistently delivers lower MI and CI values compared to traditional high-colour gamut, general-purpose UV ink sets. Its breakthrough technology makes it an excellent solution for printing intricate wood-grain designs on edge bands. By addressing the challenges of metamerism, colour constancy and durability, these inks enable manufacturers to create furniture that is both visually appealing and built to last. With high indoor lightfastness, Agfa’s inks ensure long-lasting colour quality even in environments where light conditions vary. Additionally, the ink set is compliant with IKEA’s regulations, guaranteeing both sustainability and exceptional performance. Agfa’s inks are capable of reproducing rich, natural wood grains and maintaining consistency across a range of lighting conditions. In this way, they are setting new standards for quality, durability and performance in the furniture industry.