Currently, there are two main categories of CTP technology: thermal and photosensitive, and the debate over which one has more development prospects, thermal CTP or violet laser CTP, has never stopped.
An article published in "American Printer" magazine last year pointed out that many people currently regard thermal as an expensive technology designed for large-volume printing. In fact, this is a misunderstanding of thermal CTP.
Myth 1: Thermal CTP is expensive
Violet laser imaging has been described as the most economical method of producing digital printing plates. The article points out that this is only a conclusion based on the price of purple laser CTP, and does not take into account the actual total price paid by the user. Just as buying a car at a low price of $1,000 does not guarantee that future costs (such as gas, repairs, etc.) will be low. It is unreasonable to choose CTP based solely on the price of the hardware. Thermal CTP can reduce many processing costs and reduce the overall cost of printing. For example, the price of thermal CTP laser diodes is 100 times cheaper than the cheapest visible laser light source. Thermal CTP does not require safety lights or darkrooms, which can reduce facility costs and improve the working environment. In addition, the storage of thermal plates is more reliable than some visible light CTP plates, which can save the cost of job reprinting. Compared with the silver salt CTP plate developing device, the thermal plate developing device requires less maintenance. The service life of the thermal diode is longer than that of the visible light laser, and the loss caused by interrupting production due to laser replacement is also small.
Misunderstanding 2: There are few thermal plate suppliers and the plate materials are expensive
In fact, there are more suppliers of thermal versions on the market today than there are suppliers of violet laser versions. There are only three or four manufacturers of the purple laser version, while there are as many as 28 manufacturers of the thermal version. We have reason to believe that due to the large number of manufacturers, the price of thermal plates will continue to decline.
Misunderstanding 3: Thermal CTP is only used by large printing plants that print long runs
Purple laser is aimed at printers with smaller printing volumes, but this does not mean that thermal CTP is not suitable for this type of market. Small printing plants lack complete testing methods, and most of them have to imitate the CTP purchasing model of some large units, making it difficult for them to make their own decision to choose CTP. They can choose either violet laser CTP (because it is described as almost as good as thermal) or thermal CTP. A survey shows that more than 10% of installed CTPs are idle. Considering that most CTP equipment has been installed for less than 5 years, it is shocking that 10% of CTPs are idle. Obviously, some printing plants purchase CTP systems that are outdated, have poor performance or are expensive to run, which are difficult to function in production and have no resale value. Thermal CTP systems are scalable and easy to resell. Relevant data shows that the sales volume of thermal CTP plates is more than 50% higher than that of visible light plates. The sales ratio of thermal CTP to violet laser CTP is 3:1.
Myth 4: Purple laser CTP and thermal CTP have the same quality
Thermal square dot technology allows FM random screening in production environments. Random screening has many advantages, the most interesting of which is that the colors printed by random screening are rarely affected by the tone of the paper, which means that less bleached paper and recycled paper or less expensive paper and cardboard printing can be used . The light spot diameter of thermal CTP can be as small as 10μm, which can print extremely high-quality fine prints. Thermal CTP provides superior process control, speeding up print preparation without requiring excessive adjustments to the press. Overall, thermal CTP can provide stable quality, bright colors and clear dots. For printing plants that want to increase productivity and win in the fierce competition, thermal CTP is indeed your wise choice.
Huida Print-All Technology company is an advanced and professional manufacturer of producing printing plates, mainly sales CTP, CTCP, and PS plates as well as offering ODM/OEMs, especially for the offset. For more information, please click the official website link here: https://www.huidaoffsetplate.com/.