Plastic packaging is all around us—snack bags, drink bottles, shopping bags, just to name a few. It does key jobs: protecting products, making them last longer, and getting brand messages across. Light, tough, easy to shape, and cheap, plastic’s now the packaging industry’s go-to, keeping food, pharma, household chemical and other sectors ticking along.
But printing high-quality designs on plastic’s smooth, flexible surface is no easy feat. Unlike paper, plastic has unique printing properties that often leave traditional gear stuck: high-speed runs mean losing precision, while detailed printing drags production to a crawl. The Central Impression (CI) flexo printing machine has turned the tide, resolving this conflict to balance efficiency and precision perfectly—and triggering a technical revolution in plastic printing.
Printing Challenges and Material Characteristics of Plastic Substrates
The plastic packaging sector uses a variety of materials, including polyethylene (PE), polypropylene (PP), and polyethylene terephthalate (PET). Each has distinct surface properties that pose major hurdles for printing—hurdles traditional technologies have long struggled to overcome:
● Non-absorbent surfaces: Unlike paper, plastic doesn’t soak up ink. Adhesion relies entirely on rapid ink curing; without it, smudging and peeling are unavoidable.
● Variable surface energy: Surface energy varies drastically across plastic types, directly affecting ink adhesion and requiring customized ink formulas for each substrate.
● Elasticity and deformability: Plastic films stretch easily under tension, making precise color registration extremely hard to achieve.
● Differential chemical resistance: Some plastics are sensitive to solvents, limiting the use of conventional solvent-based inks.
CI Flexo Press: The Game-Changer in Plastic Printing
Boasting an innovative design, the CI flexo machine has rewritten plastic printing rules. At its heart lies a single large-diameter central impression cylinder, with multiple monochrome printing units arranged circularly around it. This revolutionary structure fixes traditional equipment’s core flaws, delivering unmatched technical advantages and standing as the go-to solution for balancing speed and accuracy in plastic printing.
Technical Specifications of Drum Flexo Printing Machine
| Model | CHCI-600E-S | CHCI-800E-S | CHCI-1000E-S | CHCI1200E-S |
| Max. Web Width | 700mm | 900mm | 1100mm | 1300mm |
| Max. Printing Width | 600mm | 800mm | 1000mm | 1200mm |
| Max. Machine Speed | 350m/min | |||
| Max. Printing Speed | 300m/min | |||
| Max. Unwind/Rewind Dia. | Φ800mm/Φ1000mm/Φ1200mm | |||
| Drive Type | Central drum with Gear drive | |||
| Photopolymer Plate | To be specified | |||
| Ink | Water base ink or solvent ink | |||
| Printing Length (repeat) | 350mm-900mm | |||
| Range Of Substrates | LDPE, LLDPE, HDPE, BOPP, CPP, OPP,PET, Nylon, | |||
| Electrical Supply | Voltage 380V. 50 HZ.3PH or to be specified | |||
Four High-Performance CI Flexo Printing machines from Changhong: Powering Full-Spectrum Plastic Printing Applications
To meet diverse plastic printing needs, Changhong has put together a full lineup of core equipment. These four high-performance CI flexo printing machines each stand out in their own niches, offering tailored solutions
Full-Servo Gearless Flexo Printing Press: It uses a full-servo drive system and gearless transmission—no more backlash errors that plague traditional gear-driven setups. This lets it reproduce intricate textures and complex color schemes with precision. The lightweight sleeve design eases equipment load and boosts stability, while the built-in quick plate-changing feature slashes setup time—striking the right balance between high precision and productivity.
Sleeve Type CI Flexo Printing Press: It features innovative side-sleeve tech for fast plate changes and precise positioning, upping plate-changing efficiency by over 40%. The lightweight sleeve cuts down cylinder load, and when paired with a high-precision guiding system, it keeps color registration accuracy within ±0.1mm. It’s a great fit for small-to-medium batch flexible production with frequent job switches—perfect for the FMCG industry’s need to toggle between orders quickly.
8-Color Non-Stop Dual-Station CI Flexo machine: Its full 8-color setup handles complex multi-color printing needs. The game-changing dual-station non-stop design lets you switch unwinding/rewinding stations seamlessly, enabling true 24/7 continuous production—efficiency is 50% higher than conventional equipment. With an integrated intelligent color tracking system, it ensures precise 8-color synchronization and top-notch color fidelity. It’s perfect for large-volume food orders where rich color reproduction and high throughput are key.
CI flexographic printing machine with Servo Unwinding & Rewinding System: Comes with a servo-controlled central unwinding and rewinding system, delivering real-time, precise tension control. It effectively solves plastic film stretching and deformation issues, making it particularly fit for printing ultra-thin films (12–50 microns) and highly elastic materials while guaranteeing consistent accuracy and stability throughout production.
Each of these four presses leverages unique strengths to provide customized, efficient, and precise printing solutions for diverse plastic printing scenarios.
Core Advantages of CI Flexo Presses: Raising the Bar for Efficiency and Precision
CI flexo presses deliver top-tier performance across applications, resetting industry standards. Their five core advantages directly tackle plastic printing’s unique challenges:
● Superior color registration accuracy: With the central impression cylinder as a steady reference, all printing units stay perfectly aligned for multi-color tasks. This achieves industry-leading registration precision—fine text and complex multi-color patterns stay crisp, meeting high-end packaging’s strict visual demands.
● Exceptional production efficiency: Quick plate-changing systems and intelligent presets cut job changeover time and material waste. This suits both high-volume orders needing fast turnaround and flexible small-batch production with frequent job switches.
● Broad material compatibility: They handle 10–150 micron plastic films—standard films, high-performance substrates, and biodegradable plastics included. Advanced tension control and temperature regulation match substrate traits precisely, ensuring consistent print quality throughout runs.
● Environmental sustainability: Working with eco-friendly inks (water-based and UV-curable), central impression press slash volatile organic compound (VOC) emissions. High-precision anilox rollers and closed-loop ink control minimize ink waste, while energy-efficient drying cuts power use. Paired with biodegradable plastics, they create a fully sustainable production cycle, supporting green manufacturing.
● Reliable color management: Integrated with advanced closed-loop color control systems, CI presses enable real-time color monitoring and smart ink supply adjustment, ensuring uniform color across every batch product. This meets brand owners’ strict color accuracy needs, reinforcing brand visual identity in the market.
● Details Dispaly
Expanding the Horizons of Plastic Packaging Applications
CI flexo printing machine tech has come a long way, opening up more uses for plastic packaging—print quality and production efficiency are both improving across key sectors:
● Food packaging: Snacks, beverages, you name it—these presses pump out top-notch prints that meet strict hygiene and safety standards. Printing on high-barrier materials, they give tight control, matching eye-catching visuals with dependable food freshness and safety.
● Household chemical and personal care packaging: Great for laundry detergent, shopping bags and other products needing a premium finish,the equipment lean on solid registration accuracy and material adaptability to bring out packaging’s upscale feel, giving brands a competitive boost.
● Pharmaceutical packaging: Meeting medical packaging’s tough precision and hygiene needs (like pharmaceutical aluminum foil, face masks), their high-precision registration and clean design align with strict industry rules—making them the go-to for medical packaging printing.
● Industrial and specialty packaging: Perfect for agricultural films, heavy-duty packaging and functional substrates requiring durability and specialized performance, it handles functional coatings and custom inks to meet diverse industrial printing demands.
● Printing Samples
Conclusion
In today’s fiercely competitive packaging market, striking a balance between efficiency and precision is now a major driver of corporate competitiveness. With its innovative structural design and time-tested tech, the Ci Type Flexo Printing Machine delivers a high-quality plastic printing solution that not only meets current high-standard production demands but also fits the industry’s future shift toward sustainability and flexibility.
Choosing Changhong’s CI flexo printing technology means adopting a combined upgrade of quality, efficiency, and sustainable development—helping your business streamline its packaging value chain and gain a decisive edge in the marketplace.
Post time: Jan-19-2026