Water Based Ink

Hi all,

I’m considering trying out some water based ink from Akua (www.waterbasedinks.com), as someone on here mentioned that they had used it for letterpress with success. I’ve now got 2 presses, a C&P Pilot and a New Style C&P 8 x 12, which both need new rollers. My questions are:

1. Does anyone have any suggestions as to the best type of rollers to get for use with water based ink?
2. This ink can supposedly be cleaned with just soap and water, but I know that water and rollers are generally not friends. Any suggestions here? Would making sure the rollers are 100% dry after cleaning help?
3. Does anyone know of any potential problems with using water based inks / soap and water cleaning with polymer plates?

Thanks!
Nina

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Don’t get composition rollers, they are NOT compatible with water. Rubber rollers should be okay.

My question, for anyone using water-base ink or thinking of it: How could you be sure your press was totally dry after cleanup? I’d be worried about water getting into inaccessable places and rusting press parts!

I previously used a lot of waterbased ink in printmaking, and made an attempt a few years ago to bring waterbased inks into my letterpress work. It was not terribly successful. I found that it was more difficult to achieve crisp, dark letters than with oil based inks and tended to dry out on the press much quicker.

However…. if you want to try it, then I’d recommend using synthetic rubber rollers and cleaning up with plain water. If you do use soapy water, make sure that you rinse it well to avoid leaving a soapy residue.

Cool,

Thanks for your input guys. Seems like rubber rollers are the way to go - maybe I’ll just get a small amount of the water based ink and see how it prints. The person on here who mentioned having cleaned up with water said he used a hair dryer afterward to make sure everything was dry!

:)
Nina

Just an update for anyone who’s interested - the peeps at Akua told me that you can actually clean their ink off using cheap vegetable oil. I’m definitely going to try it once I get my new rollers.

I used Akua inks in school printmaking class for two years… my biggest complaint was when using multiple layers the soy tends to “bleed” out and you get this awkward yellow haze. Also, it is true cleanup is a snap, but it does dry up fairly quickly. Also, keep in mind that akua ink only dries through absorption so you will need to use newsprint and change it out daily.

Akua is a soy based ink, Faust also makes a water based ink but im not sure if that is soy based or not.

We have switched over from solvent based inks to a combination of the Akua and Faust soybased (waterbased) inks. Both clean up in water and soap or veg oil. The Faust tend to dry a little better. Normally I will print between 10 and 15 colors runs on my prints. After the 5th color run, the ink has a hard time drying or absorbing into the paper. We use them both on a C&P and have never really had a problem with the rollers. We do clean thoroughly. The health benefits are well worth the problems soy based inks offer such as them oil bloom and drying issue.. Those problems can be resolved with experimentation.