BOHEMIA, NY–FLEXO, born Spring 1976, then known as the Flexographic Technical Journal, has been a fixture in FTA members’ mailboxes for going on 50 years. The Jan./Feb. 2025 edition officially lists out as Vol. 50, NO. 1. Nostalgia prompts a look back to its beginning salvo.
Topics covered in Volume 1, No. 1 remain familiar:
- “Distortion: What It Is and How To Correct It;”
- “Subtractive Color: The Great Leap Forward”
- “Metal Anilox and Ceramic Rolls for Flexo Printing”
Authors hailed from Gar-Doc Inc., Continental Can, Pamarco and Inmount Corp. Our first edition presented thoughts of future FTA Hall of Fame Members like Alexander Bradie, and John Miller.
Observations were relevant with some holding to this day. William Likens penned these words, “Success has to be defined as quality printing meeting specific requirements for an individual job by a given plant.”
John M. Miller offered, “Color has no physical reality. It is a sensation existing only in our brain; it is of the same order of reality as pain or odor.” Kenneth Bownes correctly observed, “Problems do arise concerning the interpretation of OSHA standards and satisfactory methods of compliance with these standards.”
Gerald Gartner maintained, “After the flexographer has established a satisfactory and workable distortion compensation system, he must be aware of plate making changes in his process which may affect distortion and warrant a check and if necessary, a revision.”
EARLY MILESTONES
Three more issues followed in the inaugural year. Critical topics highlighted on the cover listed out to include: Training, Quality Control, Pressroom Operations, Think Thinner, and of course, “The Flexographic Printing Process: Current Status and Future Outlook.”
Douglas E. Tuttle, a man many credit with being the father of flexography, tackled the look at flexo’s past present and future.
His ode to the past, “Historians of flexography date its origin to the beginning of the 20th century, but the process wasn’t really born at any one particular date. Rather, it evolved through a number of steps covering a longer time span, and of course the flexographic process is still evolving today. The name flexography originated about 1953. Prior to that, the process was called aniline printing, and it was frequently referred to as a rotary, rubber stamp printing process.”
The assessment of the present, 50 years ago, “Accurate, temperature controlled central impression cylinders on modern flexo presses have made possible consistent dot for dot register in quality color process printing, even on thin extensible films.”
Listing out major evolutionary milestones of flexo, Tuttle cited:
- Creation of opaque light fast, product resistant inks
- Development of the anilox metering roll
- Differential speed ink rolls and later, the constant speed/variable ratio fountain roll
- Manual, then automatic impression throw offs
- Balanced exhausts
- Sensitive and accurate unwind and rewind tension controls
- Automatic web splicing units
Pondering where things were going, Tuttle alluded to pending development of reverse angle doctor blades. More significantly, he opined, “There will be increasing design and engineering effort devoted to reducing press downtime, job changes, minimizing waste, and increasing automation. … There are many reasons to believe that the trend toward water reducible inks will continue, accelerated by increasing pressures from environmental, ecological, toxicological flammability and pollution considerations, as well as by factors of economy, energy efficiency and conservation of the world’s resources.”
He concluded with these resounding words, just as relevant in 2025 as they were in 1976.
“We are today participating in the most exciting time, with the greatest potential for growth and change, in the entire history of the graphic arts industry! Let’s make the most of it!”
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