What is screen printing in textile ?

What is screen printing in textile ?

One method of decorating fabric is screen printing, in this, a pattern is painted onto a fine silk screen with resist emulsion. The core of the screen print process involves a fine mesh, or screen, which is stretched very tightly around an unyielding frame. Any area that is not to be printed, will be masked out on this screen or mesh. To create the print, the framed screen is positioned over the item to be printed along with a splodge of thick ink. The ink is pressed through the screen.

Screen printing is a printing technique in which a woven mesh is used to support an attached stencil. The attached stencil is created to form open areas of mesh through which the ink may travel and closed areas blocking the transfer of ink to the substrate below. The ink is placed on the upper side of the screen mesh and a squeegee is used to move the ink across the screen and through the open areas of the mesh. The ink that passes through the screen is deposited on to the substrate. The ink is then cured using either air, heat or both until it has adhered to the substrate and created a permanent or semi-permanent bond.

Textile printing is the name given to certain processes which are used to produce single or multi-colored patterns on fabrics. Textile printing is normally carried out at the fabric stage and sometimes at the garment stage.

Textile printing is the technique of applying color to fabrics with a high degree of color adhesion (colorfastness). The standard methods for wet printing are flat-bed screen printing, rotary screen printing, and using an engraved copper roller. At present, the two most important methods for printing high volumes of fabric for today’s markets are flat-bed and rotary screen printing.