non chemical fountain solution system (Ihara lb-801)

[Erik Nikkanen]

I have just found out about a system that uses just plain tap water for fountain solution.

It uses UV light to treat the water. This supposedly changes the properties and makes it suitable for fountain solution using tap water and without any chemicals.

The system is distributed by Ihara and is called lb-801.

I am curious.

Has anyone used this system and does it work?

Apparently it started to be distributed in 2008 but this was the first time I had heard of it.

[Alois Senefelder]

Hello Erik,

When I was a Apprentice, we used -- Just H2O

The Witches Spell -- from

Macbeth: Double,double toil and trouble;
Fire burn and caldron bubble.
------
Fillet of fenny snake,
In the caldron boil and bake,
Eye of newt, and toe of frog,
Wool of bat, and tongue of dog,
Adder's fork, and blind-worms sting,
Lizard's leg and howlet's wing,
For a Charm of Powerful Trouble,
Like a hell-broth boil and bubble.


Regards, Alois

[Erik Nikkanen]

Hello Erik,

When I was a Apprentice, we used -- Just H2O

The Witches Spell -- from

Macbeth: Double,double toil and trouble;
Fire burn and caldron bubble.
------
Fillet of fenny snake,
In the caldron boil and bake,
Eye of newt, and toe of frog,
Wool of bat, and tongue of dog,
Adder's fork, and blind-worms sting,
Lizard's leg and howlet's wing,
For a Charm of Powerful Trouble,
Like a hell-broth boil and bubble.


Regards, Alois

We use that fine old English Christmas recipe for the Holidays too. ;-)

Thanks for sharing.

[Cornishpastythighs]

I believe this was developed by a gentleman from Japan. It uses strong magnetism to reduce the surface tension of water, the UV light might be some form of water treatment for sterilization. Only one printer in the US using this, short runs I think and it is not completely chemical free.
This was introduced many years ago by clamping strong magnets around the fountain solution feed lines. it was all a bit hokey back then.

[Erik Nikkanen]

I believe this was developed by a gentleman from Japan. It uses strong magnetism to reduce the surface tension of water, the UV light might be some form of water treatment for sterilization. Only one printer in the US using this, short runs I think and it is not completely chemical free.
This was introduced many years ago by clamping strong magnets around the fountain solution feed lines. it was all a bit hokey back then.

Yes, I do think it is a Japanese concept. I didn't see anything regarding the magnets but your explanation of the use of UV makes sense.

Maybe another "stone soup" concept. Works fine with nothing more than the basic concept but if you just add a bit of this and a bit of that, it works better. :-)

[Lukew]

The two video's on youtube say zero chemicals, just water and there is no mention of magnets just UV to alter the molecular structure of the water so it acts the same as fountain solution/IPA

[Cornishpastythighs]

http://www.iharaus.com/pdf/LadyBirdMD801_Manual.pdf
Take a look at the manual for the unit and in the first diagram you will clearly see a piece of equipment labelled 'Magnetic unit #2' and the water hoses clearly pass through this unit. They dont mention anything about magnets in any promo but clearly they are there.

[rbailleu]

by alter the molecular structure of water I assume the mean they are are making H202 hydrogen peroxide and maybe a few others and as it breaks down 2H20 and O2 more water and oxygen to help drying.

[Alois Senefelder]

Well what next ! Fountain Solution equals Heavy Water next step - Nuclear Fission



Regards, Alois

[Green Printer]

This unit cost about $50,000.00 If you use over $25,000.00 of fountain solution per year it might be worth checking. The UV is just for sterilization. You would have a cheese factory in you fountains without the UV sterilization. Now you can't us this for UV printing or you will have dried particles of ink circulating in you system. I think that would cause few starches.
After a short while the UV sterilization for convention ink will be ineffective when the tubes become contaminated and diminish the effectiveness of the sterilization process. Also you will be bleaching out pigments that will still be circulating and the will cause scratching and transfer problem. To effectively filter out the pimentos you will need 5 micron or smaller filters which will glog in a mater of a few weeks. f you go up to 10 micron filters they will take a very long time to glog but they will filter only a very small portion of the bleached pigment in the system. This also depends on grounding, water hardness, distance the unit is from the press, kind of piping pvc or copper or stainless steel.
You can by a fish tank UV water purification light and the magnetic water treaters from many companies.
Fora total investment of less that $4,000.00 you can assemble your own unit.