Activated discharge ink - extend lifespan?

[Admiral]

We mixed up a few quarts of discharge ink this morning and due to the weather, UPS stuff didn't ship out of Ohio for us (terrible state) and we weren't able to print the job today.

Would adding that + new activator to a fresh batch tomorrow say at 30% old to 70% new ink ratio work fine or is the ink bad for sure since we will be printing tomorrow?

The job being printed is high quantity and that much ink going bad could lead to a shortage...

[Screened Gear]

I am sure this depends on the brand of ink. I use CCI. I have used the same ink many times over weeks. Just make sure to keep it sealed and add enough water so the top layer of ink is under water. Activated DC inks when they sit in a container will dry out, so the added water helps. I always use the same amount of activator when going to print.

I would make sure you test first. DC is not the same for everyone.

[Admiral]

CCI and Sericol is what we're using.  You are saying you just re-add the same % activator originally? That would be my plan but I wasn't going to straight up use that ink but rather put it into a new mix at most 50% new 50% old but probably more new ink.

This will be a 25-30 hour after initial activation use if I choose to use it still.

[Colin]

First question really is.... What are the ink colors?

Some pigments will degrade when activated, specifically red.....

[Orion]

http://www.theshirtboard.com/index.php/topic,7216.msg73846.html#msg73846

[Screened Gear]

CCI and Sericol is what we're using.  You are saying you just re-add the same % activator originally? That would be my plan but I wasn't going to straight up use that ink but rather put it into a new mix at most 50% new 50% old but probably more new ink.

This will be a 25-30 hour after initial activation use if I choose to use it still.

I do 5% activator in my white ink. I don't usually have color inks left over so not sure on those. I use any were from 3 percent to 5 percent on color inks. Those I would test and add small amounts of activator until the ink is discharging correctly. White you can over activate colors you can not without making the color lighter than you wanted.

I have had some white still discharge about 50 percent over 2 weeks after I activated it. So the agent does last in the ink much longer then over night. I personally would  remix your colors. DC inks are cheap and the chances of something going wrong increases with used inks.

[ebscreen]

White sure. Certain non-key colors, sure. Pantone replications? No. Or maybe.
Once you get the hang of it, if you see a color coming out a certain way, you can usually tell how
to bump it the right direction.

If we need inks in the AM, we will mix them the day before, sans activator. Close tightly and sharpie
the amount of activator needed on the lid. Saves quite a bit of downtime for morning discharge runs.

[ZooCity]

Nothing like some morning discharge.

We had better luck doing this with Sericol.  CCI, loaded at 20% or more tends to turn into something that resembles red clay in appearance.  Definitely mist a bunch of distilled water in there before sealing tightly. 

We don't really do this anymore as it seems to just over complicate things.  Wasteful though it sounds, it's not often worth $20-30 or more of labor in the extra testing and tweaking to save $5-10 of ink.

[mimosatexas]

I do a lot of small runs with discharge where I use less than the minimum amount of ink required simply to cover the design on the screen.  I find that I can't really reliably mix less than 200 grams, and some jobs only use 50 or so of certain colors.  This basically means I had to find a way to save activated ink.  I found that keeping activated ink in a fridge, sealed, and with a tiny amount of added water will last multiple months without issue.  I have run tests with every color imaginable after long periods of time without any color issues.  I usually add 1% activator and a spray or two of water from a squirt bottle, mix, and print.  This is with Matsui, white and colors.

[Admiral]

I went with half the activator as already in the old inks (they were actually still working) and am mixing that at 30-50% ratio into freshly mixed fully activated inks.

Color seems the exact same, discharge is working great...ink will be used up just fine.  It was an issue of potentially not having enough of one of the colors of ink if I couldn't use it.

If I put this in the right section and searched the right section I would have found that thread on this.  Crisis averted though.