Screen mesh panels - the myths, the facts, and the future

[Evo]

So to recap, good statics will still produce a good print (anybody wanting prof PM me and I'll send you some samples). But they have to be good statics. Not everybody would benefit from starting with newmans.

I agree that a decent static frame will produce a nice print. The first shop I ever worked at did shirts for art museum gift shops with wood frames. These were 4CP and duotone prints of some very famous paintings and photographs, and the prints were beautiful.

However, if they had been done on nicer screens with proper tension, the shop would have reaped the benefits. Less ink usage, lower off contact, less wiping the ink buildup during production, easier reclamation, etc etc. We could have produced who knows how many more prints in less time with better screens.

Newbies need to be taught that better screens = better production. Most any screen can produce a nice print. Good screens can produce more of them over time.

I have no problem with a new shop buying some statics. I have a problem with a sales person telling them that's all they will need. (margin-driven advise)


It's all about education and printers should be armed with the facts to make the right decision for what works best for THAT shop. I wish the internet had been around when I started printing. I'd have been a thorn in the shop owners side, this is sure.   

[DouglasGrigar]

I am not so sure there is any real indication that the facts of higher tension exist and that the benefits range from essential to miniscule. I predict this is going to reappear again and again it will focus on specific application.

Am I reading this right? Big opening with lower (but proper) tension is possibly more important than high tension? SHould we start another topic?

I'm hoping to find that out for myself real soon.... I just received 2 yards of 110,160,230 "S" mesh to use on some 20 x 28 newmans that I'm putting together.

I've got about 20 PanelFrames in rotation.... every time I put a tensionmeter on them I think "these are too low"... yet they print fine. I don't know what Sefar thread is in them, but the ink clears better than most statics I've used. So, maybe the mesh opening (thread size) is as critical as the tension ??

Yes and no - I made a typo but the general idea you started down is correct.

How about this:

I am not so sure there is any real indication that anyone is arguing that the facts of higher tension exist and that the benefits range from essential to miniscule. (edited for a big typo - my mistake)

Yes there are benefits of hight tension, but there are other variables to contend with (outside of whoring frame sales).

And yes there is more than a few sources indicating that the best print with a given ink is not always maximum tension and it is a flat out fact that open thin thread mesh has print qualities that you will not get with thick threads at even excessive tension.

My fault for having several ideas at one time and typing....  I wanted to indicate that thankfully there was not a big blow out drag out over this as we have seen before and everyone was at least contributing to the conversation and considering variables.

How many of you remember the arguments on Scott’s boards on this issue where it blew up out of proportion. Remember how some new people were berated until anger and frustration started to boil out of control (and some guilty parties make this SOP for some reason).

There is no reason to berate a new person - and thanks for piping up with the frustration story, it is not uncommon. This is the type of person I deal with every day - some dork who has “been printing for a billion years” almost guarantees that a shop is about to go out of business.

Tears people, tears of frustration, and I am not kidding it happens all the time, the first few days with a shop in shambles and it starts the first day.

Adults under the impression that this stuff can’t be that hard or difficult (it is not it just takes time and some direction or some pain).

[blue moon]

back to some more facts . . .

So, as stated, wider opening seems to trump (or so some of us believe) the tension. "S" mesh at lower tension is said to provide a better print.

But there is more than one factor at play here. The "S" thread is thinner and thus has a lower theoretical volume of ink deposited. Also, having a lower tension, it will flex more and stretch more and who knows what else that I can't think of right now. How do these factors influence the quality of the printed image from the opacity and sharpness perspective?
What about the ability to cover the hills and valleys of teh weave?
Are we laying down more ink at the expense of sharpness?
At what point is the thinner screen too soft and loses the advantage to a thicker tighter mesh?

OH, and I just came back from the dark room and  one of the EZ panel frames popped while drying. I checked the tension on the remaining screens and it is at 24N, so they are not too tight. This is really starting to PISS me off! If I was to switch to the EZ frames with 225's and 330's right now, I would be breaking one screen per day. That is just not an option!

[blue moon]

Tears people, tears of frustration, and I am not kidding it happens all the time, the first few days with a shop in shambles and it starts the first day.

Adults under the impression that this stuff can’t be that hard or difficult (it is not it just takes time and some direction or some pain).

not crying yet, but very, very unhappy!

[DouglasGrigar]

back to some more facts . . .

So, as stated, wider opening seems to trump (or so some of us believe) the tension. "S" mesh at lower tension is said to provide a better print.

But there is more than one factor at play here. The "S" thread is thinner and thus has a lower theoretical volume of ink deposited. Also, having a lower tension, it will flex more and stretch more and who knows what else that I can't think of right now. How do these factors influence the quality of the printed image from the opacity and sharpness perspective?
What about the ability to cover the hills and valleys of teh weave?
Are we laying down more ink at the expense of sharpness?
At what point is the thinner screen too soft and loses the advantage to a thicker tighter mesh?

OH, and I just came back from the dark room and  one of the EZ panel frames popped while drying. I checked the tension on the remaining screens and it is at 24N, so they are not too tight. This is really starting to PISS me off! If I was to switch to the EZ frames with 225's and 330's right now, I would be breaking one screen per day. That is just not an option!

Make sure you talk to jim and sherri about this issue - You should be able to talk to them about changes to prevent this - and by the way this is not rare with very high tensions, ask anyone who goes for L3 on a regular basis...

To get some of your answers you can take thin (S) medium (T/M) and a thick (HD) and tension them to their respective same level of tension (L1, L2, L3) each at the same targeted tension.

Then print with the same technique for reasonable to good EOM, pick a design and print that same design with all three. I dare say you will be surprised, one thing people miss is restriction of ink flow and how that impacts the print.

If you wanted to take that to the next level you could print and highest level tension, then go to L2, then L1 and print same design same ink - again you will likely be surprised. There is a reason the thin threads are making an impact at the moment and gaining use in the wild.

[ZooCity]

2 part post:

Part the first...

Pierre, I have 150s and 225s on M3 rollers right now @ about 24 newtons as well.  They are holding strong and not having the popping issues your referring to.  Previously I had them up a little higher and this was stressing out the mesh at the knuckles, giving me the same frustrations you're experiencing.    I think this is why:

I went over to more S mesh after giving the high-tension thing a go (60n on many screens and 45n as a bottom end).  In the process of going high-ten I took a good hard look at every point in it's travel that one of our screens could get damaged and this includes the squeegee blade and the substrate beneath and it includes "atmospheric" things like heat and whatnot.  After adjusting the process to be "mesh-safe" we stopped popping the high-ten screens.  Now, we don't pop the S thread screens either except in extreme screw up situations like poking a thumbnail into the screen while pulling tape, etc.

The S mesh is simply delicate.  It appears to benefit from "strength in numbers" (like 305 v. 330) at the same thread diameter in resisting blowout but here we're sacrificing open area to get some extra security which is maybe not the best move. 

So go through every little point of travel of your screens and make it a friendly territory for your mesh. 

*one note is that even a 4n difference in tension can be enough to stress those thin threads out and bust a screen.  our tension meters may not be in calibration with each others so I guess keep that in mind.

Part the second...

What are you seeing for tension on your aluminum statics with S mesh?  I'm curious as to where they stabilize at.  Believe this or not- I actually miss using statics!  They're light, easy to handle, square on the edges for pre-press alignment, clamp well on the press, no maintenance, durable along the frame/mesh contact area thanks to that nasty-ass cyanoacrylate glue they're built with and, if well-made, flat and true.  No extra retensioning steps just print to reclaim to coat.  And, they do stabilize at some point.  Dealing with the time in between "out of the box" tension and stabilized tension is the part that sucks.  It extra sucks having it happen on press.  I have a hunch that if you could pre-work harden S mesh and properly affix it to a good, true, static frame you'd have a contender to the other systems. 

This is something nobody's brought up in the "funny math" of panels v. bolt mesh v. rollers v. statics v. hybrids-  compared to statics, all of the rest require extra labor steps in your print shop.   If 24n is as high as you can go with the mesh you have on any of those systems well then....do retensionables have any benefits in a low tension mesh system?

[DouglasGrigar]

If 24n is as high as you can go with the mesh you have on any of those systems well then....do retensionables have any benefits in a low tension mesh system?

I don’t want anyone to think that I am advocating “low tension” but high and low tension are an area of some marketing v. working facts.

Generally recognized as the “minimum tension” is the 20 Ncm level, and 20 Ncm will prevent the one major problem with loose mesh “mesh rolling” where the squeegee pressure will actually move the image out of position in a way that is progressive to the end of the stroke.

What is “high tension” in the land I live and work with wood 110 white mesh screens that are lucky if 5 Ncm is on the fabric and everything is warped - well that is the type of shop I work with most of the time.

Should we not be talking about “proper working tension” and the results of the same?

Where “sales people” from some “supply dealer” told them they only needed 110 mesh, SBQ, no-name ink, and an oven element made into a flash - well I can tell you I know tears and frustration on a regular basis, my job is to try and fix that.

[Printficient]

Let's face it, I hate to type.  With that said, from what I read the problems addressed are two fold.
1. Squeegee pressure.
2. Ink deposit.

As to #1...
Excessive squeegee pressure is in my opinion the number one cause of frustration.  I have seen squeegees bent in half on autos for years.  When asked why they did this they all said the same thing, need more ink.  Before you say it I have witnessed this problem on both types of screens.
The retens were at 40n+ and the press being used was not able to hold the parameters.  The static was what it was.  Both examples were printing the way they had always printed without taking into account the improvements made in the inks and chemistry they now used.

As to #2...
It takes less ink to cover if the ink is not pushed into the shirt.  I will say that a reten used properly will allow for easier lay down of ink on the shirt.  My issue is that most who use retens do not use them properly.  I mean they do not have the tools to set their presses for maximum benefit, they stretch them too tight, and do not use the proper microns on their mesh.

Basically anything over 30n is not helpful.  As to 305 mesh the "Perfect" tension is exactly 25.5n.  At that tension the openings are perfectly square.  This info is obtained from "Control Without Confusion" by Joe Clarke.

However the true use of the screen is simply a carrier for the ink.  The true culprit here is the squeegee and misuse thereof.  For instance a 18" wide print on a 23x31 frame. 

All I am saying is that there is more to it than the screen.  For either to be the cats meow the other would not exist.  Retens are nice when used properly.  The learning curve is much greater than with a static.  With the proper squeegee to give you the lightest pressure a static can and will hold tension for a long period of time. 

Do not let a salesman sell you anything you do not need or understand, myself included.

Thanks for the dialog.
 

[alan802]

back to some more facts . . .

So, as stated, wider opening seems to trump (or so some of us believe) the tension. "S" mesh at lower tension is said to provide a better print.

But there is more than one factor at play here. The "S" thread is thinner and thus has a lower theoretical volume of ink deposited. Also, having a lower tension, it will flex more and stretch more and who knows what else that I can't think of right now. How do these factors influence the quality of the printed image from the opacity and sharpness perspective?
What about the ability to cover the hills and valleys of teh weave?
Are we laying down more ink at the expense of sharpness?
At what point is the thinner screen too soft and loses the advantage to a thicker tighter mesh?

OH, and I just came back from the dark room and  one of the EZ panel frames popped while drying. I checked the tension on the remaining screens and it is at 24N, so they are not too tight. This is really starting to PISS me off! If I was to switch to the EZ frames with 225's and 330's right now, I would be breaking one screen per day. That is just not an option!

Damn Pierre, that is really weird having that many panels busting.  We've remeshed about 10 frames, 6 ez's and 4 newmans with s thread mesh and we've only busted one in about 8-10 months.  We have however been on a screen busting spree of late where almost one per week is getting nicked or busted, but luckily, they're not the s threads.  I sat the guys down last week and said if this keeps happening I'm gonna be watching them all day/every day until I find out who is the one handling them incorrectly, and there hasn't been one busted in 2 weeks.  We've gone a year without busting a screen before, and now we've busted 20 this year alone.  I go above and beyond with protecting the outside of the screens with polyken tape so I know our screen busting issues are coming from mishandling.  A hole in the middle of the screen doesn't happen for no reason.  I understand your frustration over busted panels.  It's very, very nerve racking, it makes me want to start busting heads and firing people.

Douglas, I consider the ez's a hybrid type screen.  In my little opinion, they are great and have handled everything we've thrown at them.  If this was a perfect world I would have nothing but newman rollers and they'd all be at perfect tension but I've certainly reaped many benefits from using the ez's.  I don't think they're better than newman rollers, but they settle in at a very reasonable tension level for us, low to mid 30's for just about every mesh count, except the s thread.  It takes about 10 minutes for us to get one into production, and most of that is putting the polyken tape on for protection. 

There was a brief time where I was maxing out our tension levels with our newmans, 110's were at 50-55 newtons, so were the 156's and I didn't notice any benefits but spent a ton of time maintaining the roller frames at such a high level.  Now I've come back to earth slightly and we keep our newmans at 35-40 newtons, depending on mesh count of course, with some mesh counts being lower due to their specs.  The ez's are 30-35 newtons right now and are performing almost as well as the newmans.  We can print faster through the newmans, get a little better ink shear/deposit but the ez's have their place in our shop for sure.

I've had the ez's in production for a year and a half right now without retensioning any of them, and that's not long term enough for some but I would bet that some of them have been through the cycle 50-75 times by now and all is good.

[Evo]

A hole in the middle of the screen doesn't happen for no reason.  I understand your frustration over busted panels.  It's very, very nerve racking, it makes me want to start busting heads and firing people.

I keep this in my head all day:

"This is not a screen, it's a thin sheet of glass."

or

"This Newman roller is filled with explosives."


It helps.

[tpitman]

A hole in the middle of the screen doesn't happen for no reason.  I understand your frustration over busted panels.  It's very, very nerve racking, it makes me want to start busting heads and firing people.

I keep this in my head all day:

"This is not a screen, it's a thin sheet of glass."

or

"This Newman roller is filled with explosives."


It helps.

Oddly, the sound you always hear right after one pops is "aw, sh_t!" Must have something to do with the sudden release of the tension on the rollers or insertion strips.

[blue moon]

Just talked to Jim at Shurloc. . . It turns out that I am not crazy even though the rate of failure is higher than normal. I bought my panels a while back and they have since reduced the tension due to similar issues. We talked about some of my screen practices and found a few places where some adjustments can be made. In lieu of everything I've decided to start using regular 305 murakami mesh for my day to day and have a few 330's for the occasional high end work. I went ahead and ordered about 20 panels, and will start slowly phasing out the high mesh statics. I look forward to trying those out. They should be a considerable improvement over my regular screens . . .

[Socalfmf]

Good move Pierre....we went shur-loc and neumans years ago and wow what a difference in set up times, reclaiming and just better prints...it has all been said here....I just believe in using the right tools for the job vs. struggling with each job because of substandard equipment or items....

Sam