Made in India: Anilox rolls and sleeves from Acme Rolltech

Acme Rolltech started producing ceramic anilox for narrow-web conventional presses in April 2019. According to Parag Koradia of Acme Rolltech, apart from narrow-web, these products have a good market potential in offset coating, CI flexo presses and specialty coating requirements.

Acme offers the regular 60 degrees hex structure, besides offering specific anilox rolls and sleeves for high opacity white printing, called AHG45.

Koradia says ceramic anilox roll is the heart of narrow-web flexo printing. “Rubber rolls pick ink from the ink chamber, which is then transferred on anilox rolls. From anilox rolls, the desired ink volume is transferred to the plate and finally to the substrate,” Koradia explains how anilox rolls works. “Different types of anilox LPI-BCM are used to achieve the desired printing results.”

For customers, choosing an anilox roller is not rocket science. “Frankly speaking, there is not much technicality involved in the selection of rolls. Depending on the print results a customer wants, 
he decides specific LPI-BCM  values and shares with us and we supply them the desired anilox,” he says.

Koradia says apart from the regular uses, customers have used the company’s rolls in technical textile applications as well, which is a new development in the field.

World class
Acme Rolltech claims to be the only Indian manufacturer to produce anilox rolls in the country. Koradia says within six months of starting the commercial production, the company got the opportunity to work with various segments. “We are happy to say that we got the product quality right in the first attempt and customers have 
shown their appreciation, considering the fact that it is the first time that anilox rolls and sleeves are being manufactured by an Indian supplier. We provide both new and refurbished rolls/sleeves,” he explains.

Koradia says the company has installed a world-class facility to ensure that it delivers the best quality products. “We dispatch the rolls within 20 working days to our customers as compared to the current lead time of 45–60 days,” he says. 

About the pricing, Koradia says the company has ensured that its customers get the best quality products at competitive prices. He says, “Customers want action to be taken when they have a problem. We stand by our customers during crisis. Fortunately, we have not received any such complaints  till date.”

Koradia says to build a long-lasting relationship with customers they want to know that they are appreciated. “We, at Acme, always ensure that we have good relationships with our customers.” 

As it started commercial production only six months back, the company has done little export. But it has been doing both refurbishment and new rolls/ sleeves in India.  In this sort span of time, Acme has delivered anilox rolls and sleeves to all printing industries, like narrow-web, wide-web, CI flexo, stack flexo, offset, technical textile and speciality coating and lacquering applications for films. 

Using ceramic 
Koradia says for getting the precise transfer of inks and desired print results, ceramic anilox rolls are the best available options in majority forms of printing.

“Ceramic anilox rolls and sleeves are coated with special ceramic material which has very high surface hardness. It gives long service life of rolls and sleeves with accurate ink transfer after multiple print runs. Again, ceramic material can be laser-engraved up to 2,000lpi to get desired cell structures to meet printing industries requirements,” he explains.

The USP of ceramic anilox rolls is the better service life compared to other alternatives. “Ceramic anilox rolls and sleeves run for years unless it gets damaged by manual handling, whereas chrome-platted rolls won’t give that much of service life,” he says.

To produce quality ceramic anilox rolls and sleeves as per industry standards and requirement, Acme has housed state-of-the-art infrastructure and equipment. The installed infrastructure is capable of producing rolls of diametre from 50mm to 600mm and length from 150mm to 4,500mm with screen range of 50lpi to 2,000lpi with different cell structures. 

“We are always on our toes to serve our customers. We have a well-experienced team to understand customers’ requirements and give them solutions,” Koradia says, adding, “There is a very thin line between producing a good product and producing a good product consistently. To be consistent, there must be systems for each and every process on the shopfloor. It has to be system driven. The product improves quality by doing periodic analysis of data, issues and problems related to production, developments, customer support, etc.”

The market
Koradia says the market is looking up with so many narrow-web printers looking forward to enter the mid-web size printing requirements. 
“They are looking to go beyond 17-inches web width and non-supported printing media. I would like to say that the narrow-web flexo printing industry is rolling up its selves to get into flexible packaging and printing industry," said Karodia, adding "And it would be a giant leap forward for the industry and will create new developments and requirements." .

As for Acme’s role in the growing market, Koradia says the company is already serving narrow-web and wide-web printers and would like to add more printers from India as well overseas. 
Karodia concluded, “Our main focus for this year is to add more OEMs to our client list."