Statistical analysis of the influence of print run on surface roughness of digital flexo printing plates’ solid tone areas
In this study we have aimed to present statistical evaluation of changes in the surface roughness of the solid tone areas on CtP flexo printing plate in dependence of print run. Changes in flexo plate surface roughness is influenced by the plate-making process, printing pressure and speed, the interaction with the ink and printing substrate and by the wear of the printing plate due to long print-runs. Thus, the aim of this research was to evaluate the changes in the amplitude surface roughness parameters (Ra, Rp, Rv and Rz), between the printing plates used for different print runs. In the experiment, we have employed three sets of CtP flexo printing plates, for three colors-cyan, magenta and blue. The first set was not used for printing, the second was used to print 7 rolls of substrate and the third is used to print 11 rolls of printing substrate. The amplitude surface roughness parameters were compared by applying independentsamples t-test method using the software SPSS (Statistical Package for Social Science) with a 0.05 significance level. Statistical analysis revealed that the difference between the amplitude surface roughness parameters measured on CtP flexo printing plates are significant with a 95% confidence level, whereas the statistical significance pointed out that with the longer print runs, the difference will be strongly expressed.