AS Colours 100% cotton shirts don't discharge

[Raw Paw]

Hello there print family.  We embarked on a large multi color discharge job today only to find on the first shirt that AS Colour 100% cotton does not reliably discharge.  The results were similar to discharging on a comfort colors, maybe even more dull and muted than CC.  White, green, and yellow were all very muted when compared to our standard bella canvas shirts.  The specific shirt is Men's Classic Tee 5026 - Black.

[TCT]

Think like most brands it depends.... I have never asked AS Colour if they have a re dye policy in place. But we have discharged the 5051, 5001 and 5052 all black shirts, turned out good. One of them was even like a 5-6 color with a ton of gradient and blending.

It would be interesting though to know if they have a re dye policy in place.

[Maxie]

It’s not only a problem of re dye.     Not all dyes used are suitable for discharge.

[Raw Paw]

Think like most brands it depends.... I have never asked AS Colour if they have a re dye policy in place. But we have discharged the 5051, 5001 and 5052 all black shirts, turned out good. One of them was even like a 5-6 color with a ton of gradient and blending.

It would be interesting though to know if they have a re dye policy in place.

Thank you very much for this info.  Very strange that their "Classic Tee" (5026) does not discharge.  It is also a heavy weight shirt, we have had issues discharging other heavy weights, such as Hanes Beefy

[RICK STEFANICK]

There are cotton garments dyed with Reactive dyes and Pigment Dyes. This is critical when discharging. There are some comfort colors that discharge excellent depending on the dye process

[studioayc]

This is a reply I got from my rep at AS Colour about discharging their shirts

"Like most forms of decoration on AS Colour garments, they can’t be treated the same as a Gildan tee etc. as the quality of the cotton and the weave of the fabric and the general all round quality of the garment far exceeds the others and will need to be approached differently. Same goes with DTG on our garments, they will require slightly more pre-treatment than you would on a Gildan tee etc. and generally a higher curing temp.

It is possible to achieve bright whites when discharging on our garments, they just require different attention than other garments that your printers may be familiar with. Factors such as pressure on the autos are a massive factor as AS Colour garments tend to require a little more pressure due to the finer weave of our garments. As you know, a finer weave means a finer print, but as discharge needs to be embedded into the garment more than plastisol or water based inks it will means pressure settings, whether on an auto or manual, need to be approached accordingly.

Occasionally you even have to run them through the dryer twice if they are coming out a bit inconsistent. You may also need to add an extra 1-2% of agent sometimes to make it really pop."

[ericheartsu]

we are starting to back out of printing discharge due to the current state of apparel.

Garment manufacturers are RACING to get goods out, and we are seeing corners cut left and right.

Discharge is not dependable anymore with all the factors outside of our control.

[zanegun08]

Agreed with Eric, we are still doing colors with discharge but white discharge is no longer a good product across ink manufacturers.

If you are printing lots of discharge inks you should do wash tests often and prolonged because we are having our white discharge fail after 1 wash, while other colors still look decent.

We instead do discharge base with white high solid acrylic on top, and still do some discharge colors when matching a Pantone isn't critical and the correct color.

Whatever changed in the ink manufacturers / supply chain they are being hush about it, but we've tried multiple inks and they all have subpar results, they look decent until washing, and this is in regards to shirts that discharge great.

ASColour is not one of those shirts that discharge great, they know it and point the finger at the printer, rather than dialing in their manufacture process to have better reactive dyes in my opinion.  It is a nice tee though   Anyone negotiate free freight with them?

[studioayc]

that is good to know I will probably just go HSA for the black Ts instead of trying to make the discharge work. Recently had a client provide some of the off white AS organic long sleeves and they printed really nice so I got an account to try them out for a few projects

[BRGtshirts]

we are starting to back out of printing discharge due to the current state of apparel.

Garment manufacturers are RACING to get goods out, and we are seeing corners cut left and right.

Discharge is not dependable anymore with all the factors outside of our control.

Eric, you switching to all HSA or normal WB printing? 

[ericheartsu]

we are starting to back out of printing discharge due to the current state of apparel.

Garment manufacturers are RACING to get goods out, and we are seeing corners cut left and right.

Discharge is not dependable anymore with all the factors outside of our control.

Eric, you switching to all HSA or normal WB printing?

we still do a fair share of DC. we have things pretty dialed on that front, but in general, most customers, we do a dcub base and White HSA on top.

but to be clear, we only print with HSA, DC, or low solids WB!