squeegee pressure on an auto

[alan802]

We also flood harder than most anyone that I've seen.  Depending on the ink thickness, sometimes with darker inks you can see the stencil image after the flood before the print stroke.  I've found that flooding hard can knock off 5-10 psi off of squeegee pressure.

A friendly competitor's shop recently got an RPM and he's been by a few times to pick my brain about the print pressure settings and they are having a little harder time getting used to the new press and are having to double stroke lot's of things that they didn't in the past with an older challenger.  I'm going to go out to his shop probably next week and see if I can't nail down why they are struggling, but we double stroke less than .1% of the screens we put on press.  He's not used to dealing with a printhead pressure regulator along with squeegee up/down.  They always dialed in squeegee pressure with moving the squeegee up or down.

One little reason why I am intrigued by discharge/wb printing is it seems from a far that you don't need to be as precise with squeegee pressure to get a great print, and tension and many other variables aren't as important to have perfectly dialed in.  There are many other reasons why I think our shop would benefit from making the move away from plastisol, but that is just one little one.  I think there would be additional wear and tear on the press by printing with 50% more pressure and driving the ink into the shirt, but never flashing and always printing wet on wet seems awesome to me.

[tonypep]

Alan......you are somewhat correct about the discharge printing however it bears mentioning that the  flood pressure is actually more critical.
You want a nice even bead of ink across the mesh. As high as possible to ensure a nice wet stencil. Halftones 230-305 mesh need to be double stroked while spot colors 160 or lower single stroked.

[alan802]

I was hoping you'd chime in Tony, thanks as usual.

Do you use the thinner thread mesh or the standard "T" for your screens?  Anything you can add about mesh specs or what you get the best results with?  Murakami has a nice technical article on the benefits of the S thread for discharge printing and it makes sense, but they are also trying to sell and product so I have to take it with a grain of salt until I hear it from several printers.  I know Patfinn loves the S thread but I haven't heard much else about it from you non plastisol guys.

[tonypep]

I've not read the article although it would make sense that given two identical mesh counts; one with more open area than the other; the more open mesh would be optimum. I have never played with that stuff. I just never had an issue with the mesh itself.

[DouglasGrigar]

thinner thread mesh or the standard "T" for your screens?

The “T” designation is at best generic for the mid range meshes, it is not a “standard” as much as a popular choice because of it’s "middle of the road" compromise nature. It is an important variable.

Murakami has a nice technical article on the benefits of the S thread for discharge printing and it makes sense, but they are also trying to sell and product so I have to take it with a grain of salt until I hear it from several printers.

There are specific benefits for plastisol also, selling mesh may be the goal but giving technical information that is incorrect will only sell a mismatched product ONCE and no manufacturer wants the lack of return sales and bad reputation - Murakami is not “blowing smoke.” But then I was a proponent of thin thread meshes 10 plus years ago and got pounded by the “max tension” guys (note that is not that I propose low-tension, just correct, targeted tension).

I haven't heard much else about it from you non plastisol guys.

No one has the time... find a shop dealing with the alternative inks for garments that are doing great work and you will find a slew of guys that get very little sleep...

There are several monumental “game chagers” around the corner as far as ink is concerned and the new composite thread meshes will be part of that change.

[alan802]

I look forward to the upcoming game changers.  Will you be at the ISS Ft Worth show this year Douglas?  Maybe you can fill me in on some of the new things that are on the way.

[DouglasGrigar]

I look forward to the upcoming game changers.  Will you be at the ISS Ft Worth show this year Douglas?  Maybe you can fill me in on some of the new things that are on the way.

Yes and yes...

Possible game changers:

Plant oil based inks with some characteristics similar to plastisol making it more attractive to the average plastisol printer.

Composite meshes where the internal structure is made of some “super strong” material incased inside of a smooth outer layer giving higher strength with thin threads.

It is just a matter of time and application. I also see some promising advancements in exposure and DTS...

Sad but often “just around the corner” for our industry can be a long time... how long did it take for retensionable frames? 

[bimmridder]

Are we ever going to get rid of "T", "S", "HD" etc and just use the thread diameter, ie 123-55, 123-70? Just curious. I've been using thread diameter for years now, but I seem almost alone in this. (By the way, "S" threads have been around for years)

[ZooCity]

Plant oil based inks with some characteristics similar to plastisol making it more attractive to the average plastisol printer.

Composite meshes where the internal structure is made of some “super strong” material incased inside of a smooth outer layer giving higher strength with thin threads.

It is just a matter of time and application. I also see some promising advancements in exposure and DTS...

Damn.  Sounds good to me.  What's the hold-up?

[DouglasGrigar]

Are we ever going to get rid of "T", "S", "HD" etc and just use the thread diameter, ie 123-55, 123-70? Just curious. I've been using thread diameter for years now, but I seem almost alone in this. (By the way, "S" threads have been around for years)

It continues to be useful in that it is descriptive of a concept not a specific diameter of thread, because there are often five choices in diameters from a single company to use the old “T,S,HD” is conceptual and it works...

We continue to use S,M, L, and XL for shirts - sizes change as it crosses manufacturers, but we use the S,M, L, and XL outside of the specific dimensions.