By Melissa Donovan
Printable rigid substrate selection continues to grow—from traditional aluminum composite materials and foam board to paper-based board with the attractiveness of being recyclable. The February issue of Digital Output includes a chart listing various rigid substrate vendors. View at this link.
Here we highlight products from some of the vendors included in the chart.
3A Composites USA, Inc.
3A manufactures an array of substrates for graphics, signage, and display. All offer high-quality, premium surfaces ideal for digital printing applications, with various finishes, colors, and textures available to create a high-impact display. Solutions include clay-coated, paper-faced foam boards, expanded PVC boards, high-performance foam boards, aluminum composite materials, and recyclable, rigid paper boards. Brands include GATOR, FOME-COR, SINTRA, DIBOND, DISPA, and LUMEX G.
American PERMALIGHT
Photoluminescent signage is now required by building codes inside high-rise building emergency staircases and enforced by local building and fire inspectors. Nationwide standards, such as UL924 and UL1994, enforce tough luminance requirements for floor identification signs inside high-rise buildings, EXIT signs, emergency signage in passenger trains, on-board passenger ships, and other life safety applications, each with their respective stringent luminance requirements. PERMALIGHT offers the matching compliant rigid substrates for these various requirements.
DGS – Digital Graphic Systems
The ROOTS Eco-Friendly Rigid Substrates Line is a product developed by DGS consisting of a range of rigid, paper-based substrates especially formulated for large format UV digital printing. In the search for sustainable options for the industry, DGS makes a variety of products available to printers that are alternatives to synthetic materials such as PVC or polypropylene. Cardboard in all its varieties—honeycomb, corrugated, etc.—has little explored properties and currently there is an important trend for its use in previously unthought of applications such as point of purchase (POP) displays, trade show booths, structural signage, and furniture, which simplifies the process of both production and logistics in an environmental friendly context.
E&T Plastics
E&T distributes all kinds of printable plastic substrates. It offers a range of sheet sizes that customers benefit from when it comes to yield loss. The company stocks everything from PVC foam to styrene and all plastics in between. It also offers run-to-size and cut-to-size options. With white glove service to keep material clean in processing, it knows you will be happy working with them.
The Gilman Brothers Company
The Gilman Brothers is a North American manufacturer of foam board products depended upon by graphic arts professionals to create merchandising signage as well as POP displays, exhibits, and wall art.
Its quality line of foam board products is manufactured with a proprietary, non-pillowing Reveal foam center. Engineered to retain its thickness and cut cleaner and faster on digital cutting/routing equipment, the foam boards are warp- and dent-resistant.
InSite Reveal features a smooth, bright white paper liner with a moisture-resistant clay coating for superior ink coverage and exceptional color gloss.
INFINITY is made with a proprietary digital grade styrene surface that eliminates preproduction cleaning prior to printing and provides a super-smooth printing surface.
EAGLECELL is a recyclable, all-paper honeycomb graphics board with triple-thick, bright-white, clay coated liners manufactured with 100-percent fully recyclable paper core and surface papers.
Hexacomb, a PCA Co.
Falconboard is a rigid custom printable honeycomb paperboard for signage and displays. It is produced in five of seven Hexacomb honeycomb manufacturing plants across the U.S. including Santa Fe Springs, CA; Kalamazoo, MI; Trenton, IL; Auburn, WA; and North Haven, CT.
SFI certified, Falconboard offers 40 percent post-consumer recycled (PCR) paper content. It is 100 percent blue bin recyclable at the end of its life. With a honeycomb core, the product is super light, yet strong. It is available kraft, white, and black colors.
Laminators Incorporated
Laminators is a full-service manufacturing company offering complete, innovative, and turnkey solutions for your sign panel needs. It offers a full line of digital print-ready panels that are the industry standard for professional sign makers.
The rigid substrates are strong, durable, and ready to use. Available in a variety of colors, finished surfaces are smooth and will not crack, chip, flake, or peel even under harsh weather conditions.
The array of cores—corrugated plastic, solid plastic, and furniture-grade exterior plywood—as well as the various thicknesses, sheet sizes, and double/single-sided sheets satisfy any sign or fabricated project.
Save on time and labor costs by having Laminators fabricate your digital print-ready sign panel products. It’ll cut, rout, and bend the panels to the exact specifications needed for the project.
Monadnock Paper Mills
Monadnock ENVIsual is a renewable fiber-based coated rigid board designed for a new generation of retail and hospitality graphics, POP displays, and signage. ENVIsual Board is plastic free—made with responsibly sourced FSC certified wood fiber. Even better it’s recyclable in the curbside mix paper waste bin. Sustainable, versatile, vibrant, durable, flexible, and recyclable. Lose the styrene and envision your brand on Monadnock ENVIsual Board.
Panel Processing, Inc.
Panel Processing is a composite wood panel manufacturer who provides panels for digital printing and fixture needs. Panel punches, cuts, paints, laminates, and machines a multitude of wood substrates to create digital print media, chalkboard, marker board, slatwall, laminated panels, and pegboard that can be found in store fixtures, schools, and RTA furniture.
Pegboard Skinz pegboard paper punching service offers quick, easy, and cost-effective display versatility.
Flat panels, slatwall, chalkboard, pegboard, and marker board can receive Panel’s digital print media, Eco-Finish, creating an excellent surface for high-quality digital or screen printing.
Primex Plastics Corporation
New from Primex is Prime ReCycle PCR content printable materials. They are available in polystyrene, polypropylene, high density polyethylene, and Cor-X.
Prime ReCycle PCR Polystyrene is a high-impact polystyrene manufactured using prime virgin resin and 25 percent PCR materials to create printable and thermoformable sheets and rolls. The PCR content comes from products that have reached the end of their life and have been recovered or diverted from the waste stream.
Prime ReCycle PCR Cor-X is a corrugated polypropylene sheet with PCR content. It is designed to help support broader recycling efforts and lessen the amount of plastic in landfills or the natural environment.
Recrylic
Recrylic is one of the world’s only lines of certified recycled acrylic—ideal for use in displays, signs, lighted fixtures, and architectural elements. As a seamless alternative to traditional acrylic, Recrylic helps preserve natural resources and reduce waste.
Recrylic is available both as bulk sheets and with expert fabrication for finished projects. Find out how much CO2 you can save with a free estimate at recrylic.com.
Ultra Partners, LLC
Ultra Partners are industry-leading pioneers in paperboard and printing. It represents Mako-Board, which is a smooth, bright white, premium paper board that was designed to be recycled. It’s a sustainable, long-lasting alternative to plastics for indoor applications exposed to hot, cold, and moist environments and is exceptionally durable when used for temporary outdoor signs. Replace rigid plastics with environmentally friendly Mako-Board for both indoor signage and packaging, and for short-term outdoor signage. Disposal is easy and 100 percent recyclable.
It also represents Oppboga boards, which has been producing paperboards from the Swedish countryside in Fellingsbro for 120 years. The sign and display portfolio includes a diverse range of paperboards to attract and inform your target audience. Choose colors and textures that best reflect your brand, from kraft brown or jet black to snow white, boutique silver, grass speckled, or silky white. In addition, the portfolio includes moisture-repellent paperboards for moisture-resistant signage or short-term outdoor use. The carefully selected raw materials are sourced from responsibly managed forests or contain recycled fibers or sun-dried grass from fallow land. As such, they are an ideal alternative to composite panels made from plastics or other non-renewable materials. Product lines include Oppboga Excellent and Oppboga Resilient.
Vycom, now part of Plaskolite
The Vycom Celtec premium signboard solutions product line is designed to improve throughput in finishing, enabling print service providers to consistently and confidently produce high-value display graphics applications. The Celtec family—including DigiLite, Woodgrain, and Thick Gauge materials—is a complete range of thicknesses, finishes, and textures, for extruded PVC sheets available from a single manufacturer of 100 percent U.S.-made products. All Celtec materials are 100 percent recyclable and can be reclaimed through Vycom’s Recycling Program, which captures and recycles printed and unprinted PVC, PE, and acrylic sheets, as well as scraps and drops from finishing and fabricating.
Rigid Substrate Options
With a number of suppliers serving the graphic arts industry the options are endless when it comes to rigid board.
Feb2024, Digital Output
