I received a lot inquiries from customers, in addition to Material Safety and Decal Printing that all of us concern, the most question that was asked is connected with manufacturing process of the bamboo fiber. I was willing to tell them but I never give too many details, this is not because I am holding back something intentionally. manufacturing is more complex than I can describe in a short email and it is confidential.
You may wonder in some industries or any other tableware in plastic, supplier never hold it as a secret. why it is different for bamboo fiber or rice husk? well it is really different. let me explain why before we go deeper in this article. Plastic products have no secret in manufacturing, the working system is more simple. material itself is chemical and universal standard, with a mold and injection machine, then you can start(check below injection machine that is used to produce plastic container). the whole manufacturing process is also highly automatic in recent years due to highly paid labour in China. this industry has been very competitive because of no differences existing. but things are still different at bamboo fiber end. it still relies on more labour work and have many more manufacturing process than plastic. mold is different, printing method is different(we use decal to replace printing), we need to design a different workshop layout and work flow to comply with the highest production efficiency and good product quality. the material composition is also definitely confidential. those are important to maintain the competitiveness for bamboo fiber manufacturer. once there is no barriers to enter, bamboo fiber this new industry will be soon stucked in the same situation like plastic or melamine.
That being said, as our customers, you deserve to know what the product is and where it comes from. I am happy to be one of the fewer people who would like to share manufacturing details with every of our kind readers. if you find it helpful, you are welcome to share this to your facebook and other social website.
The first thing I would introduce is how to “print”. notice I add double quote which means printing is not printed. if you are familiar with ceramic mug or melamine tray, possibly you know what is Decal. decal is just one piece of paper with artwork printed. but it works no worse than printing(check the product pictures on my website.) due to material difference, bamboo fiber is not able to be printed in a direct way. the best way to customize your artwork on the product such as 5pcs kids plate set is using the same technology that is used for ceramic- Decal. check below what the decal looks like. absolutely same like a color paper.
Manufacturer never produce decal, to divide the work with higher efficiency. that generally is all out supplied from other suppliers. once decals arrived, factory needs to put them in drying machine for 6-8 hours in case the colors blend during decal’s cutting(next working procedure). afterwards workers will spray a thin layer of power on the decals to add the lightness and protect color from damage. check below picture for better understanding. left is drying machine, right one is worker spraying powder.
Decal will be sent to cut into product shape after being dry and well protected. cutting is very skillful workmanship, worker should be very careful and experienced when operating. cutting tooling should be sharp enough and 100% correctly positioned with decal’s printing boarder. a slightly shift will destroy all decals.
After decal is all finished cutting, usually for plate or tray, no need for this procedure, but one more step for cups, decal should be glue wrapped, which is also a gentle and precise work, such as a cross strip on the design, after one round wrap, the strip should be still horizontal and in the same line. and the glue should be precisely adequate, glue should not be used too light to have the decal come apart easily or too heavy to deform the decal. in this regard women usually can do better job than man does.
To Be Continued…
Authored By Mark
