The unit is designed to help companies manage the colour of textiles, plastic parts, and coatings accurately and affordably.
X-Rite has introduced the RM200QC handheld spectrocolorimeter to give companies an inexpensive yet powerful way to record and communicate colour differences to speed introduction of new products and reduce instances of scrap.
The hand-held RM200QC simplifies how textile, coatings, chemicals, plastic molding and other industries can compare the colours of lab samples or parts in production with reference standards, then create reports that can be shared with supply chain partners.
The new instrument goes well beyond the capabilities of existing colourimeters with advanced features that identify colour differences between samples and standards, opacity, and grayscale assessment, as well as highlighting how colours may change in appearance under D65 daylight and Illuminant A household tungsten-filament lighting, The RM200QC is inexpensive enough for companies to purchase multiple units that can be stationed at individual machines or at critical steps in a workflow to alert quality control personnel if a manufacturing process is out of control. The instrument is particularly suited to help companies that currently manage colours by comparing incoming raw materials or finished products with colour swatches, fan decks or sample products.
X-Rite employs a proprietary camera technology in the RM200QC that illuminates the surface being measured from three different directions while simultaneously recording 27 colour-accurate images in 1.8 seconds, eliminating the shadows and interference inherent to patterned and textured materials and surfaces. With 8 different visible illuminations and 1 ultraviolet illumination, the RM200QC is able to more accurately define the location of a colour in colour space than traditional colourimeters that typically have only three illuminations of red, green and blue light.
Quality control or quality assurance personnel can be trained in a matter of minutes on the operation of the RM200QC. Operators can select between 4 mm and 8 mm apertures and preview the sample area on the instrument's full-colour display, then take a measurement in less than 2 seconds with the press of a button. The instrument then gives results in the form of a simple pass/fail message or CIE L*a*b* values and delta E colour differences. It also reports results in all of the standard colour difference equations and tolerances, such as CIELAB, CMC, CIE 94, or CIE 2000.
The RM200QC memory holds 20 standards and up to 350 measurements automatically stamped with time and date and saved as PDF and CSV files that can be downloaded easily via USB cable so the information can be shared with other stakeholders in a supply chain. Any measurement can be linked with images of test surfaces, text notes, or voice messages and the reports can be output in multiple languages.
Companies involved in plastic injection molding and extrusion, cut-and-sew operations of textiles, master batch formulations, coating and painting processes and manufacture of building materials will find immediate applications for the RM200QC, said Matthew Adby, Product/Market Manager for
X-Rite.
X-Rite
www.xrite.com
