DOE Consumer Goods Application
The bottom line:
A printer manufacturer received complaints from a major customer. To satisfy this customer, the ink had to look great as well as meet 7 performance criteria. With our help, they developed three interactive color inks that met all visual and performance criteria in only four months. The customer was so pleased that he made a very large order for printers.
The project:
Each color ink was used in the new printer in a dot-on-dot way to produce a full color spectrum on paper.
Each ink must:
- have correct viscosity (not too runny or too thick)
- remain in solution (not crust inside the pen or on the nozzles, blocking ink flow)
- be stable over a wide temperature range
- remain brilliant on paper for a certain time period
- dry quickly on paper
- not smear or rub off paper
- be non-toxic
Many attempts by highly experienced chemists failed to solve the problem. After a year of experimenting, no useful result had been found. Failure was almost admitted.
A critical component of the development process was missing. When Design of Experiments was taught to one of their chemists, he used it to find the solution in four months.