What Are Solvent Inks?

"Eco-solvent ink generally does not require special ventilation in the printing area" -- not true, because all ink produces fumes, one way or another and the only safe way to prevent a dangerous level of intoxication over the years is if your production house installs adequate ventilation fans, air-ducts to take the fumes away from working area, and decent humidifiers installed to desaturate the air, because every percentage point you can reduce the toxic fumes adds up huge to your health account.

Remember there is no such thing as zero fumes during the solvent printing process. I've worked over nine years in an eco-solvent printing environment, and good ventilation is definitely a must.

I worked as a graphic designer in an office for many years, and our big printers used solvent ink. The copies of ads that we printed out on paper had to be of good quality, since the sales representatives had to take them out to customers for their approval.

Even right after a piece of paper passed through the printer, I could not smudge the ink, even if I tried. This was great, because I had to quickly paper clip that printed ad to an ad sheet with the customer's information on it and pass it along to the sales rep. All of this provided many opportunities for the ink to get smudged, but it resisted.

It was nice not to have to wash my hands every time I touched a printout. I also loved not having to blow on the paper to dry it before handling it, like I have to do with printouts from my home printer.

I have passed by many outdoor signs and wondered how they kept their color. The sun is a powerful bleacher, yet it could not touch this ink.

Solvent ink is amazing like that. All those political signs you see in people's yards around election time have to be printed with this type of ink, because many of them are in bold reds and blues. It would be embarrassing to the candidate for his sign to fade to pink or purple in the sun.

Also, small businesses often have banners printed with solvent ink. They post these banners out by the road or at the edge of their parking lot to attract business, and the more vivid the ink is, the better the chance of attracting customers.

@orangey03 – You would think because the term “hot off the press” refers to the newspaper that they would use heat to dry their solvent inks, but I learned while working at one that they don't. This is why the ink comes off on your hands when you hold a newspaper.

My boss told me that the paper gets printed so rapidly that there is no time for it to dry. Thousands of sheets get printed each minute, so there is no slow passage under a heat source.

This is why our fingers turn black as we read a newspaper. The solvent ink was rushed out, and unlike the ink on magazines and catalogs, it had no opportunity to air out.

I always wondered why the paper coming out of my printer was warm. Now I know that it was because the solvent ink needed to be dried by heat.

The copy machine works the same way. When I run off dozens of copies of memos, they all come out hot to the touch. Picking them up right after they emerge is like grabbing fresh towels from the dryer.

I'm actually glad my printer and copy machine use solvent ink, because there is just something so comforting about picking up paper hot off the press. The ink never smudges when I touch it accidentally, so I guess this heat and dry process works very well.