Discussion Has Chromaluxe Changed their Formulation for Aluminum Semi-Gloss Panels

[RGBPrints]

Greetings,

For the last 2.5 yrs we've been using Chromaluxe panels, Glossy, Semigloss, Matte, Outdoor, and Clear. And for the most part, in this time we've had very little issue, with only the occasional 'one-off' defective or problematic panel.

But now our last two received Semi-Gloss shipments have been of panels that come out of the press heavily fogged and covered in residue. The residue appears to be removed when cleaned with Isopropyl but the colours of the entire panel are visibly and measurably less vibrant, less bright and lacking in contrast.

When we received the first problem panels, a pallet of 100 8'x4', and after realizing that every panel was giving us this problem, we managed to RMA them back to Chromaluxe. Thankfully we had some stock of older panels that kept us pressing until replacements could be shipped.

The new shipment, this time two full pallets, once again exhibit the same fogging and print quality issues.

Testing the new panels against the few remaining older (2024) panels.
I printed identical files at the same time on our Epson F7200. Then pressed the panels individually using the same preheat and press times that we've been using for the last 2 yrs.


As pulled from press no Cleaning.



We've tried extending the preheating of the panels, extending the press time, shortening the press time and as of yet nothing we've tried as has made any improvement.

Has anybody else noticed this happening with panels received in the 6 months?

Anybody figure out a solution that we haven't?

We are currently waiting to hear back from Chromaluxe.

 

[Andrew Heiner]

We are seeing this with the matte panels currently. Nothing changed... and we have old stock to compare them to as well and they are just not the same.
Our regular supplier "discontinued" the mattte finish and this is a new batch from a new supplier. Regardless I am sending them all back as these are not going to work.

I have noticed that sometimes if a panel is really old the humidity can be a little weird. As in the panels will soak up more humidity and require a longer prepress / dry.

What did you find out?

 

[RGBPrints]

We are seeing this with the matte panels currently. Nothing changed... and we have old stock to compare them to as well and they are just not the same.
Our regular supplier "discontinued" the mattte finish and this is a new batch from a new supplier. Regardless I am sending them all back as these are not going to work.

I have noticed that sometimes if a panel is really old the humidity can be a little weird. As in the panels will soak up more humidity and require a longer prepress / dry.

What did you find out?

Well unfortunately we didn't find out much. We were asked to send back some samples of the 'fogging' panels so they could take a look.

We printed 3 copies of two different images. These were printed all simultaneously off the same printer using the same RIP profile.

Next we pressed the the images, one of each to the newly received panels. The remaining prints were pressed to old stock we had on hand. Each old stock panel was from different batch as evidenced by the batch numbers etched on the back. Each panel was pressed using the same time and temp and on the same press. The old stock panels came out of the press clear and vibrant. The new panels came out of the press 'foggy' and coated in residue.

We shipped all the panels to Chromaluxe and waited.

After a couple of weeks they informed us that their techs were able to clean the panels and that the fogging issue was obviously an inking/printing inconsistency on our end. This of course completely disregarded the fact that the prints were all produced at the same time from the same printer and pressed identically on the same press. The fact that there was a noticeable visible and measurable difference in contrast and vibrancy after 'cleaning' was not addressed.

Looks like this is the new Chromaluxe.

I would also note that in the last 3yrs the only fogging we ever noticed was on the Matte panels. We only do a very small amount, maybe 1-2%, of Matte, so it wasn't really something we were concerned about and just figured that that was a normal property of the Matte finish.

After pressing literally thousands and thousands of clear and vibrant Glossy and Semi-Gloss panels I can confidently say something about the newest batches is different. Hell, even pealing the protective plastic is different, maybe its New Adhesive? Maybe the formulation of the coating was 'tweaked'. Who knows? not Chromaluxe and not us.