Printing over zippers

[ericheartsu]

Ok, I know this has been posted a ton. And i've read A lot of the threads, multiple times, but we still cannot master the art of printing over zippers.

I'm printing some Independent AFX90u hoodies, with White DC, on our auto, with a cardboard build up, plus channel for the zipper.

Prints are printing ok, but the pint color is varying from side to side. Almost like not enough ink is getting put down.

I'm also getting inconsistent quality around the zipper. Most of the time it's smooth, but from time to time, it's chunky build up.

any advice?

[mimosatexas]

Why cardboard? Cardboard is not a very consistent material. I've had the best luck with foam. I believe the kind I use is either 4 mil or 6 mil. I have a layer of pallet tape then adhesive then the foam with the channel gap in the middle then more pallet tape and more adhesive then I just score down the center. The build-up you're getting is probably from the previous stroke not fully clearing the ink and having some build up of that strokes ink on the bottom of the screen when you flood for the next print.

[ericheartsu]

Nope, we built up one pallet, just to try it out. And inbetween every print we are clearing with a tester shirt. So it's not build up.

cardboard is what we had lying around. the only neoprene we had would have been for redbull sized koozies, and i think it would have caused more problems.

[mimosatexas]

Go to Home Depot there is a white foam roll that you can get for dirt cheap. I believe it is in the flooring section but I may be wrong. FedEx or UPS stores also have like a thick packing foam that is sort of like very small bubble wrap and that works as well.

[redwoodtees]

I think cardboard can work, just not CORRUGATED cardboard. I did some zippered hoodies using mat board; that worked well. The foam roll at Home Depot is probably underlayment for hardwood flooring -- that does sound like a good idea. Comes in 100 square foot rolls. I think you'd need to build up a few layers though -- it's not very thick.

[tonypep]

Advice=Action Engineering

[DannyGruninger]

Advice=Action Engineering

What about when the width of the zipper placket is different then the groove cut into the pallet surface? We print on several different blanks of zip hoodies and most of them have different plackets. When we ran into variances like this we could not get perfect prints across the board, the only way we have been able to do that is by building our own pallets with foam.

[ScreenFoo]

Haven't done much with this, but in my limited experience, I have better luck with neoprene without a channel, or two layers, one with one without. 
The difficulty also seems to vary greatly depending on what type of garment it is.

FWIW, had more than a couple work out really well with dark psol on lights, reasonably well on middle colors one hit low mesh.
Never been able to do really well flashing... still jealous, WB/DC guys. 

[tonypep]

Advice=Action Engineering

What about when the width of the zipper placket is different then the groove cut into the pallet surface? We print on several different blanks of zip hoodies and most of them have different plackets. When we ran into variances like this we could not get perfect prints across the board, the only way we have been able to do that is by building our own pallets with foam.

[tonypep]

The pallet has a double channel and sometimes requires shimming to account for different garment mfgrs.They all have different tapes to attach the zipper and the spec varies in width and height.. Worth it if you're doing this often.

[Rob Coleman]

I think cardboard can work, just not CORRUGATED cardboard. I did some zippered hoodies using mat board; that worked well. The foam roll at Home Depot is probably underlayment for hardwood flooring -- that does sound like a good idea. Comes in 100 square foot rolls. I think you'd need to build up a few layers though -- it's not very thick.

Those underlayment materials are just a scrim coated with plastisol.  I used to sell into that market before most went to Asia.  A thicker alternative that may work well are yoga mats - they use the "same" plastisol compound coated on scrim but a thicker coating with more expansion.

[ol man]

those particular hoodies never want to discharge evenly for us ( foam pad) right around the zipper.. we have had to increase  our pigment load.

[ABuffington]

While this is about printing over zippers with an auto, the best method I found for zippered hoodies was a hot split transfer.  We had the luxury of both autos and a heat transfer dept capable of almost any transfer. (No number of color limitations, no shrinkage under a flash, no excess spray tack all over the operator, and far faster production times.  (PM me if you want to contact this company I used to work with.  They do wholesale and the guy is a 30 year vet of the industry.) 

With a good hot split transfer you can heat transfer right over the zipper and as soon as you remove the paper take a razor blade down the middle to slice the ink. (we never damaged the fabric, its a breeze)  Then throw some t-shirt fabric over the print and hit again for 3 seconds to seal the print around the fabric next to the zipper.  Easily the highest quality print you can do on a zippered hoody with far less hassle.  No need for precision loading the zipper into a channel, the print looks like the hoody was panel printed then sewn up.  The t-shirt seal for 3 seconds also imparts a screen printed look.  We also used this same method on non zippered hoodies to print over the kangaroo pocket, Inside the hoody, or over shoulder seam.  The cost?  Far less than tying up the auto and doing a slow load and having a 3-4% reject rate we experienced with direct prints.  No matter how well we selected mesh, channel materials, the seams wind up with puddles of ink that gain on the next print.  Now discharge?  You guys are brave. 

[ericheartsu]

While this is about printing over zippers with an auto, the best method I found for zippered hoodies was a hot split transfer.  We had the luxury of both autos and a heat transfer dept capable of almost any transfer. (No number of color limitations, no shrinkage under a flash, no excess spray tack all over the operator, and far faster production times.  (PM me if you want to contact this company I used to work with.  They do wholesale and the guy is a 30 year vet of the industry.) 

With a good hot split transfer you can heat transfer right over the zipper and as soon as you remove the paper take a razor blade down the middle to slice the ink. (we never damaged the fabric, its a breeze)  Then throw some t-shirt fabric over the print and hit again for 3 seconds to seal the print around the fabric next to the zipper.  Easily the highest quality print you can do on a zippered hoody with far less hassle.  No need for precision loading the zipper into a channel, the print looks like the hoody was panel printed then sewn up.  The t-shirt seal for 3 seconds also imparts a screen printed look.  We also used this same method on non zippered hoodies to print over the kangaroo pocket, Inside the hoody, or over shoulder seam.  The cost?  Far less than tying up the auto and doing a slow load and having a 3-4% reject rate we experienced with direct prints.  No matter how well we selected mesh, channel materials, the seams wind up with puddles of ink that gain on the next print.  Now discharge?  You guys are brave.

I don't know why i didn't think about doing this. We finished the print run, and they look ok. We did half yesterday, and half today, and the ones we did today look alot better. We cut up some koozies, and built a little layer under the text, and it seemed to help.

[mimosatexas]

I also usually heat press my hoodies.  Lower volumes than most of y'all of course.  Much cleaner finish though and no rejects.