Thinking about DTG

[whitewater]

Around this area, the only one i really know of is a place in the mall. They have a couple embroidery machines and a DTG. To me this scenario would work, due to the mall traffic, mostly around the holidays. BUt for us, the traffic we get would not really pay for it.

[Appstro]

Thanks or all the input guys. I really appreciate it!  I am going to go for it. I have managed a deal that will lower my monthly payments and Im hopeful my online idea will work. I will post updates when I receive and get trained on my new GT-361. If you need digital shirts I may be a good channel for you!

[Sbrem]

Though I usually wouldn't recommend Tshirtforum.com, they have much conversation there regarding all of the different machines and processes, and though you need to determine the wheat from the chaff, there is a lot of info there...

Steve

[jvieira]

We started our in-house production adventure with DTG. It works fine if you buy a decent machine and have someone dedicated to it 24/7. Do not - for a second - leave it alone. It needs A LOT of tlc all the friggin time!

We bought a Anajet mP5i, I regretted it  5 minutes later. It also cost us 25.000€ and did not come with a pre treat machine, which was a huge mistake on our part. Printing on dark garments never really worked so after a while we removed the white ink and let the lines dry. We've been working with it for the last 2 years only printing on light garments. If it was today I would have bought a DIY Epson printer for a fraction of the cost.

Unless you have a steady stream of work and somewhere where you can control COMPLETELY humidity and temperature, don't go for it. For the love of god, do not go for it! If you can work every day and control those factors, sure, go ahead

[Appstro]

Well I pulled the trigger and the install is next Tuesday and Wednesday. I am trying to think of questions to ask the installer. Like what is the best resolution for the images? What color shift to expect from on screen to actual print? Do you have any suggestions???

[3Deep]

Good post, we just looked at an Anajet at the SGIA show and got a sample shirt or two and really like the feel and how it works, I was going to start a thread but this is giving me plenty of info.  We think having a DTG machine might work for us doing the smaller jobs which we do get a call for almost everyday that screen printing price's just runs them away, we will have to study this more before we decide.  I look at the Epson DTG printers as well but I know from first hand about the epson print heads and the anajet use's a different type print head.

[Audifox]

We started our in-house production adventure with DTG. It works fine if you buy a decent machine and have someone dedicated to it 24/7. Do not - for a second - leave it alone. It needs A LOT of tlc all the friggin time!

We bought a Anajet mP5i, I regretted it  5 minutes later. It also cost us 25.000€ and did not come with a pre treat machine, which was a huge mistake on our part. Printing on dark garments never really worked so after a while we removed the white ink and let the lines dry. We've been working with it for the last 2 years only printing on light garments. If it was today I would have bought a DIY Epson printer for a fraction of the cost.

Unless you have a steady stream of work and somewhere where you can control COMPLETELY humidity and temperature, don't go for it. For the love of god, do not go for it! If you can work every day and control those factors, sure, go ahead

We bought one of the first ones out there.     
With the DTG, the above statements are impairitive to purchasing one. Have the work for it being #1. (can not stress this one enough)

The biggest thing is having it run every day or just about every day.
The biggest mistakes we  made was switching it over to do white ink. Should have left it for light colors only.
Now we have a 20K paper weight. Lesson learned.

[jvieira]

DTG really is a pain. Unlike screenprinting presses, that are built like a tank, these are computers and they're so unstable that you cannot predict what is going to happen next. We are now in the process of changing our entire warehouse to accommodate the printer with better conditions. We had to change one of the printheads in May and it cost us 2300€. That's almost 10% of what it cost us in the first place.

It's an adventure and I love the look and feel of DTG but, knowing what i know today, I would have bought an Epson or any other brand except Anajet

[Sbrem]

DTG really is a pain. Unlike screenprinting presses, that are built like a tank, these are computers and they're so unstable that you cannot predict what is going to happen next. We are now in the process of changing our entire warehouse to accommodate the printer with better conditions. We had to change one of the printheads in May and it cost us 2300€. That's almost 10% of what it cost us in the first place.

It's an adventure and I love the look and feel of DTG but, knowing what i know today, I would have bought an Epson or any other brand except Anajet

We certainly won't do it again. I'd much rather have someone with the biggest fastest printer that can give good pricing do the work, plus they've worked out all the details. Unless you have the work for it, it can be a lot of trouble.

Steve

[mimosatexas]

Someone posted about reading the threads at t-shirtforums and honestly there is a lot of info there. 

Here is what I have picked up just reading around over there:

• Brand makes a HUGE difference, both when it comes to the quality of the machine and support down the road.
• There are sort of two camps, on one side you have people building their own machines essentially from scratch (brother, epson), and on the other side you have people who are building machines based on other companies printheads (anajet, neoflex, spectra).
• The Anajet seems to have a pretty poor track record on both fronts compared to many of the other options out there. 
• The Brother 361 you got seems to be popular and have a good track record on support and the machine not crapping out randomly.
• The Epson F2000 also seems like a good option.
• Lots of people are switching to the Spectra 3000 or 600 now as well, which is a sort of new and much smaller company, and their machines are based on the Epsons.  Seem like a good value and has good support.
• Neoflex seems to have gone from a popular choice for the epson based machines to a steadily less popular choice due to issues with support and lagging behind on innovation vs the spectra.

[mk162]

We run a brother 381.  We ran a 541 for years.  The 541 was damn near bulleproof, but add white and it's a game changer.

I am still not a huge fan of white ink.  It's slow, costly and not perfected.  That being said some of the new pretreats out there really make it easier.

Brother is probably one of the more reliable and easier to use machines aside from the pretreating aspect.  Kornits have built in pretreats but you pay for that.

[jonsnow13]

Someone posted about reading the threads at t-shirtforums and honestly there is a lot of info there. 

Here is what I have picked up just reading around over there:

• Brand makes a HUGE difference, both when it comes to the quality of the machine and support down the road.
• There are sort of two camps, on one side you have people building their own machines essentially from scratch (brother, epson), and on the other side you have people who are building machines based on other companies printheads (anajet, neoflex, spectra).
• The Anajet seems to have a pretty poor track record on both fronts compared to many of the other options out there. 
• The Brother 361 you got seems to be popular and have a good track record on support and the machine not crapping out randomly.
• The Epson F2000 also seems like a good option.
• Lots of people are switching to the Spectra 3000 or 600 now as well, which is a sort of new and much smaller company, and their machines are based on the Epsons.  Seem like a good value and has good support.
• Neoflex seems to have gone from a popular choice for the epson based machines to a steadily less popular choice due to issues with support and lagging behind on innovation vs the spectra.

I agree, I've also done my research including info from tshirtforums and I've narrowed my choices down to a Brother GT-361, EPSON F2000, or BelQuette MOD1 (GENESIS maybe?).  They all seem to have positive reviews and good support.

[jvieira]

If I was to buy a new DTG machine right now, I'd either go with Brother or Epson. Probably Epson due to support in my country BUT knowing it would cost me (Epson sells Ink, they make A LOT of random cleanings that cost $$)

[bulldog]

Someone posted about reading the threads at t-shirtforums and honestly there is a lot of info there. 

Here is what I have picked up just reading around over there:

• Brand makes a HUGE difference, both when it comes to the quality of the machine and support down the road.
• There are sort of two camps, on one side you have people building their own machines essentially from scratch (brother, epson), and on the other side you have people who are building machines based on other companies printheads (anajet, neoflex, spectra).
• The Anajet seems to have a pretty poor track record on both fronts compared to many of the other options out there. 
• The Brother 361 you got seems to be popular and have a good track record on support and the machine not crapping out randomly.
• The Epson F2000 also seems like a good option.
• Lots of people are switching to the Spectra 3000 or 600 now as well, which is a sort of new and much smaller company, and their machines are based on the Epsons.  Seem like a good value and has good support.
• Neoflex seems to have gone from a popular choice for the epson based machines to a steadily less popular choice due to issues with support and lagging behind on innovation vs the spectra.

I agree, I've also done my research including info from tshirtforums and I've narrowed my choices down to a Brother GT-361, EPSON F2000, or BelQuette MOD1 (GENESIS maybe?).  They all seem to have positive reviews and good support.

I just bought a MOD1/Edge. Haven't set it up yet but all of my research led me to that. (The Genesis is not available yet.)

[GraphicDisorder]

I may pull the trigger on a Brother 381 this month or so.