Ganging designs on screens

[Frog]

I try to never mix designs, even when they fit, from the same job, typically front and back. Even when trying to save screens, whenever possible, I try to mix up the jobs, to prevent the need for a  re-setup when a shirt is found to be defective after the second print has been made.

[dlac]

On the other side of that when we were rocking and rolling running autos and making money, we ganged a lot of drops, left chests etc., and ran those manually, pritner loved it that she could drop 4-6 orders and not go chasing screens.. even if the drops were diffent colors she worked with it.. We did  a lot of 144 or more of a desing and then broke that out into smaller orders per ship and hence 144 could have 3-4 different drops..
dlac
mostly I am just writng this stuff to get to ten...

[Sbrem]

We mix frequently, but one does have to be careful.

Steve

[alan802]

I try not to burn any screens with just one image on them.  I typically put a large and small image on the same screen, and if they are different jobs, I try to have them similar in color, but if I can't get close to a color match, I'll just clean out the ink.  It takes us all different labor times for a single screen to be put through a production cycle, but anytime I can cut down the number of screens we put into production I will do it. 

[Frog]

Well, as I said, I do gang, I just try to not mix from the same job to reduce the chance of having to set up again if a shirt gets screwed up or is found to be defective when running the second side, or upon folding. Unllike Terry, I do find a bad one in every case or two.

[Clark]

We don't gang either. Seems like it was just faster to throw another screen in there when we moved to the tri-loc.  I don't do ink washups either.  takes forever to clean those things, and now we just throw another screen on the press and go.  back before we went with a dip tank we ganged like crazy and would do washups...not anymore.

[jsheridan]

We don't gang either. Seems like it was just faster to throw another screen in there when we moved to the tri-loc.  I don't do ink washups either.  takes forever to clean those things, and now we just throw another screen on the press and go.  back before we went with a dip tank we ganged like crazy and would do washups...not anymore.

This is the sanest thing to do with todays turn and burn production strategies.

Take advantage of technology and buy your time, don't try and save it by creating more work for yourself.

If you want to save money, improve the process the money is being spent on.

[DouglasGrigar]

We don't gang either. Seems like it was just faster to throw another screen in there when we moved to the tri-loc.  I don't do ink washups either.  takes forever to clean those things, and now we just throw another screen on the press and go.  back before we went with a dip tank we ganged like crazy and would do washups...not anymore.

This is the sanest thing to do with todays turn and burn production strategies.

Take advantage of technology and buy your time, don't try and save it by creating more work for yourself.

If you want to save money, improve the process the money is being spent on.

I agree, you only have to mess up one job with ganging screens and that lost production time will more than pay for five or more jobs worth of screens.

An example, you have a mixed shop of manual and automatic, the automatic is full (according to schedule) and you give a set of ganged screens to the manual press, an overrun of 500 shirts. The automatic gets free by producing faster than scheduled and the six color back is on the screens the manual is printing...

How about mistakes, missed shirts, shirt flaws, and set-up times?

I propose that screens are inexpensive for us here in the US compared to labor and production costs.

There is always a risk one is money in the screens the other is money in production of the two screens are less expensive.

[rushhourscreen]

I gang a lot of different prints together because I'm thinking I will save time & money ganging and I may only be working on a couple of jobs to do this with.  This has caused me problems here and there, when it works it's great, but you cannot underestimate the stupid things a printer can do.

[Frog]

Well, my method is a compromise. Gang, if you wish, but gang from different jobs.

[mooseman]

we try to gang jobs as follows,
mentally, (no smart a$$ comments here please) we see a strip acorss the top of the screen that holds left chest logos, we can sometimes can get 3 across on our MZX frames. lets say it is a 4 inch high by screen width area.
The next block down is for a back or front print or whatever, it starts just below the imaginary 4 inch strip and offers the rest of the screen.

we typically look at the jobs ready for burn and pile on as much as we can in the zones. The more we fill the happier we are sometimes we get 4 jobs on one screen sometimes we get just one. It all depends on what is up , on deck, what lines up etc.  Sometines the mesh is wrong when the ganging is right or the ink changes just don't make time sense or I am in a fog and just can't think straight.
The only hard rule we have is like Frog we don't gang the same job in one screen we have learned the hard way on this.

respectfully
mooseman

[Denis Kolar]

Something similar for manual machines:
http://www.screenprinting-aspa.com/2009/02/how-to-print-a-three-color-print-with-just-two-screens/

[T Shirt1]

We're bass ackwards.  We actually try to get the same colors of the front,  back or sleeve of the same job on the same screens. Especially if it's going to be a repeat custy.

[alan802]

We gang everything we can.  We don't have any issues with doing so, and every time we gang a design we save one screen.  That one screen doesn't have to be reclaimed, coated, exposed, taped, etc. and over the course of a year, we might save thousands of screens by ganging.  I understand why some shops don't, cause it really doesn't take long to just slap another screen on the press rather than flip the screen or do a color change, but I think of it by looking at the entire process that you don't have to do by saving a screen.  I'd like to know how long each shop spends on one screen to go through the entire production process? 

A minute to coat
3 minutes to expose & washout
A few minutes to dry
1-2 minutes to tape up
5 minutes to reclaim

I figure that for each screen put into production, it takes 15-20 minutes of labor, no telling how little or how much chemicals go into that screen, maybe several dollars worth overall.  I would rather save that 15-20 minutes by ganging screens since for whatever reason, we don't have to deal with any issues that arise from ganging some jobs.  It takes only a few minutes to do a color change or to flip the screen and tape up the old image, so to me, it saves us more time by saving a screen from the production process.

[Clark]

We gang everything we can.  We don't have any issues with doing so, and every time we gang a design we save one screen.  That one screen doesn't have to be reclaimed, coated, exposed, taped, etc. and over the course of a year, we might save thousands of screens by ganging.  I understand why some shops don't, cause it really doesn't take long to just slap another screen on the press rather than flip the screen or do a color change, but I think of it by looking at the entire process that you don't have to do by saving a screen.  I'd like to know how long each shop spends on one screen to go through the entire production process? 

A minute to coat
3 minutes to expose & washout
A few minutes to dry
1-2 minutes to tape up
5 minutes to reclaim

I figure that for each screen put into production, it takes 15-20 minutes of labor, no telling how little or how much chemicals go into that screen, maybe several dollars worth overall.  I would rather save that 15-20 minutes by ganging screens since for whatever reason, we don't have to deal with any issues that arise from ganging some jobs.  It takes only a few minutes to do a color change or to flip the screen and tape up the old image, so to me, it saves us more time by saving a screen from the production process.

I guess it would depend on where that time is coming from.  If you're doing a color change and the press is waiting, I don't think you're saving any money.  If you gang and all the color changing and retaping, etc is done off press with another job being run during that time perhaps you are saving money.  We used to gang everything, but don't do it anymore.  I personally would rather just throw another screen on and get to printing.  I do the same thing for color changes as well.

I'd guess I have around 12 minutes into each screen.