wooooooooooooooooooooooo, don't try this at home kids!

[screenprintguy]

Man, I came in this morning to find out one of our flashes a Reno was left on all night. That means, it was on from 8am yesterday till 8am this morning. Very thankful the pallets were out of the way and it regulated itself all night. I know M&R has the claim to fame that their gear runs 24/7 in shops, but it's a lil scary to think that thing was on 1000 degrees by itself all night. Now I don't want to push it, so turning it off for a few hours and sub it out with another roll up flash. Testament to the gear though. When I touched the house and checked it out, sniff test and all, no difference than if I had just turned it on.

[kingscreen]

This happened in our shop a couple times. In my attempt to idiot proof everything (even from my own idiocy), I moved all the flashes and heat presses onto separate circuit breakers which all get shut off as part of the end of day routine.

[jsheridan]

It runs all by itself 8 hours a day 5 days a week 220 day a year at 1000 degrees

why would that be any different overnight..

To put this into perspective.. the last shop I was at.. ran the big dryer and a few machines 24/7 for 3 months.. the dryer nor the flash units had their power shut of for 3 months.

[screenprintguy]

whaaaaaaat really John, three months? WOW talk about some serious power bill huh lol.  I guess the scary part was not being here and knowing it was on all night.

king, good idea with the breaker!

[tonypep]

My guys left both IR flashes on on one of the presses over Thanksgiving. 48 hrs straight.

[tonypep]

oops  96 hrs!

[screenprintguy]

oops  96 hrs!

daaaaaaayuuuuuuuuuuum

[jvanick]

I'm not a licensed electrician, but:

If you're going to use your breakers as switches that get turned off every night/morning, make sure you get SWD or HID rated breakers, not the typical ones that you put in a panel.

The contacts are heavier duty and are rated at a higher power factor.  the HID ones are rated for high intensity lighting circuits which have an initial draw higher than the rating of the breaker.  You might want to consider these if the heat presses/dryers turn on immediately when flipping the breaker.

As always, I'd get the recommendation of a professional electrician licensed in your area.

[3Deep]

Good equipment is all I got to say about that, we left the heat press on over night once and it's still kicking today.

Darryl

[jvanick]

Really not too shocking... the most stressful time on equipment is the initial warm up.  Not to say that leaving it on won't reduce the useful life, but it won't hurt it as much as cycling it on and off a bunch

Sent from my SCH-I545 using Tapatalk

[Admiral]

This happened in our shop a couple times. In my attempt to idiot proof everything (even from my own idiocy), I moved all the flashes and heat presses onto separate circuit breakers which all get shut off as part of the end of day routine.

Not a bad way to keep the place safe...

We have end of the day checklists for certain workers to make sure the stuff gets done.  Then the person who closes the shop checks things are off as well.

More importantly our flashes can't stay on over things to burn the place down anymore anyway - we use a rotating IR on the manual and quartz flashes for the autos.  With our old Reno flash one platen was burned from an employee leaving it on (and a platen under it) which was noticed 3-4 hours later with a lot of smoke in the back and burnt rubber top...not fun.

[screenprintguy]

This happened in our shop a couple times. In my attempt to idiot proof everything (even from my own idiocy), I moved all the flashes and heat presses onto separate circuit breakers which all get shut off as part of the end of day routine.

Not a bad way to keep the place safe...

We have end of the day checklists for certain workers to make sure the stuff gets done.  Then the person who closes the shop checks things are off as well.

More importantly our flashes can't stay on over things to burn the place down anymore anyway - we use a rotating IR on the manual and quartz flashes for the autos.  With our old Reno flash one platen was burned from an employee leaving it on (and a platen under it) which was noticed 3-4 hours later with a lot of smoke in the back and burnt rubber top...not fun.

Yeah I'm to blame for leaving the Reno on last night. I wanted to do a set up to have ready for first thing in the morning, closed up on my own and even when I got home, thought man, did I turn it off. Which normally OCD wouldn't allow me to miss that, but dam if I didn't leave it on. Another good reason to get ready to switch over to all quartz. Kinda hate the IR flashing anyway, just my personal opinion.

Isn't that burnt pallet aweful!!!!!! Had that happen a few times, real nasty!!

[jsheridan]

Yes mike.. 3 months they ran like that 

I'm not a licensed electrician, but:

If you're going to use your breakers as switches that get turned off every night/morning, make sure you get SWD or HID rated breakers, not the typical ones that you put in a panel.

I'll echo this.. not a good idea to use breakers as 'switches'. Each time you 'switch' it, you lessen the contact points and over time that wear will lessen the breakers load rating.

[Northland]

I've got my Ipod docking station right next to the receptacle for the IR flash.
When I'm done for the day, shutting off the music and the flash is always a one-two punch.

[Evo]

I still do a walk around each press when I leave, even though I'm the pre-press guy now. The press ops also do a careful walk around before they go.

Presses off, flashes off and compressor off and drained every day. Also the pressure washer is turned off, and the hose valve shut off and the hoses relieved of any pressure. (failed water line or hose in shop = BAD. Long story but I've seen it first hand)