Ganging Images-split from DTS pros and cons

[bulldog]

Very interested to see what you come up with.

[3Deep]

Ganging screens sometimes is a production killer unless it's small jobs I can toss on the manual press as well.  I have a bunch of 18x20 screens from my old Hopkins press dam near new so I decided I would use those for left chest imprints, less emulsion use on those.  I hate to use a full 20x28 screen for a left chest, so here is a question if you could buy left chest screens or small imprint screens would you and would that save you production time and emulsion tape etc.

darryl

[Gilligan]

We have toyed with the idea of keeping our 18x20 mzx's for left chest and small designs... probably wouldn't be worth it and will likely sell them.

[mk162]

we try and gang for a couple reasons...mainly I don't feel like nearly doubling our screen inventory.  I try not to gang on the same job, but if we do you just dry wipe the screen and flip it and you're set.

[Sbrem]

Maybe I'm not looking at this through the right glasses, that's why I asked the question.

put your money glasses on and think cost per minute.

an 8 hour shift only has 450 minutes to be productive

labor hour in the screen room = $11.00 = $.18 cents per minute

labor hour on press = $250 = $4.16 per minute

to clean a screen on press is both a time and money loss.

I can do the simple math here, but I'm wondering how the labor costs are so dramatically different, $11.00 vs. $250.00... I'm missing something I think.


Steve

[alan802]

Yeah Steve, if it were really that black and white it would be an easy decision.  Where I'm at so far this morning is I've got an average of 11 seconds to tape up the second image on the screen so that it doesn't get contaminated with ink and I've got 2 seconds to pull off that tape before using it.  I haven't had a chance to time the screen switch-over where we tape up the shirt side of the image we just got through printing.  And then I'll look at the differences in reclaim between a 2 imaged screen and a single, along with the time it takes to peel the tape off the shirt side of the first image.  Can anyone else think of other things I need to look at with the watch?

[Homer]

Yeah Steve, if it were really that black and white it would be an easy decision.  Where I'm at so far this morning is I've got an average of 11 seconds to tape up the second image on the screen so that it doesn't get contaminated with ink and I've got 2 seconds to pull off that tape before using it.  I haven't had a chance to time the screen switch-over where we tape up the shirt side of the image we just got through printing.  And then I'll look at the differences in reclaim between a 2 imaged screen and a single, along with the time it takes to peel the tape off the shirt side of the first image.  Can anyone else think of other things I need to look at with the watch?

fixing the leaks.

[alan802]

Leaks?

[Homer]

when ink goes under your tape / block out and leaks out from the other design...aka "whatthefukisthis?"

[ebscreen]

Watch in reclaim too, for us when we tape over an image and any ink gets in the open area it mixes with the adhesive and makes
a nasty mess, even with using pallet tape.

[alan802]

Homer, what type of tape are you using?  Not that it's never happened but rarely does ink work its way under our tape and we use the 2.0 mil rubber based adhesive clear tape.  I think Intertape makes the one we've used the most over the years. 

I've got some new tape coming in this week (at least it better be here this week or I'm going to be in trouble and so will my tape supplier) so do you want me to send you 50yds or so of the tape we use Homer?

[IntegrityShirts]

If it's the same color left chest and half-sized back I gang them 100% of the time. Pull the squeegee/flood, flip the screen, insert flood behind the ink, chopper down, and drag it up to the stopping point for the back print. If it's tshirts I don't tape off the left chest. If it's hoodies with a pocket you definitely need to tape or the pocket will pick up fuzzy ink in the open area of the left chest.

I also gang different orders with the same colors all the time. I try to avoid having to tape off the old design as eb said it gums up the ink. I can see the benefit of only one exposure per screen if you have a crew running and gunning all day and you load the back print and the front print on press at the same time, might save a few minutes which adds up.  But most shops have to wait for the fronts to run through the dryer before the stack comes back around to print the backs. That's a solid 2 minutes for flipping a screen or plopping in a new one.

[ebscreen]

But most shops have to wait for the fronts to run through the dryer before the stack comes back around to print the backs. That's a solid 2 minutes for flipping a screen or plopping in a new one.

That's actually a really good point I hadn't thought of.

How does everyone organize ganged screens? That's a major issue for us too. When we put a job on the job cart it can be hard
to be like "oh and the black screen for the back is with that other job over there" etc etc.

[Sbrem]

But most shops have to wait for the fronts to run through the dryer before the stack comes back around to print the backs. That's a solid 2 minutes for flipping a screen or plopping in a new one.

That's actually a really good point I hadn't thought of.

How does everyone organize ganged screens? That's a major issue for us too. When we put a job on the job cart it can be hard
to be like "oh and the black screen for the back is with that other job over there" etc etc.

I think this is going toward, "it depends..." A really busy shop would have the screens ready to go with the job, just pop them in and print. A smaller, less busy shop has more time, and the change over in concert with the rest of the shirts going down the line works out pretty well. As I mentioned earlier, we've always ganged prints, with our thought being that we hate to waste the emulsion by not having a print on it. But in retrospect listening to the arguments of both sides, the extra production far outweighs cost of the screen. Perhaps it's wisest to gang jobs that don't go together but use the same mesh, this way they get get cleaned in the normal cycle, but come back to the press instead of the screen room.

[ZooCity]

My take on this is no ganging if you want/need complete flexibility in scheduling.  Becomes a lot more pertinent with multiple machines and/or shops pushed to the brink of their production capacity every day I think.

If total flexibility in scheduling isn't needed then I think ganging is good where appropriate.  Same colors is a no brainer.  Ganging different jobs on different screens can be ideal as well.  25x36 frames are ideal for this. 

Where it sucks for us is when a screen has a problem and needs reshot.  That could hold up two jobs for the day, not just one and I'm not keen on that.