I finally found a deal on some M3 roller frames

[Gilligan]

It's intimidating but not tough... Go too far with your corners when you start, better safe than sorry , right?

[IntegrityShirts]

I'd recommend both.  Buy a few panels and buy some ECONOMY bolt mesh.  Stretch up the panels to full tension, take note of softened corners, get the feel for it.  Then stretch some from bolt mesh and practice practice practice.  I made the mistake of starting with murakami S mesh and wanted to pull my hair out learning how to properly soften corners, deburr rollers, and not rush the tensioning phase.

Used frames add extra elements of surprise as well.  Dirty locking strip channels, burrs or bent lips, stiff roller rotation.  All those factors throw a wrench in quickly learning how to stretch frames.

I'm pretty confident now with stretching manually and I get in a groove and stretch frames on non-printing days.  I'd love to snag a used roller master one day.

Time is money BUT when stretching bolt mesh don't rush it.  It'll only piss you off more after you're a newton away from target tension and you pop it because you didn't soften that ONE corner enough or deburr the frame in one spot.

[ZooCity]

The difference between panels and bolt mesh is who you allow and pay to load your mesh- yourself/employees or the panel mfg.

If you are saving money buying panels it means your are too slow at making screens for your pay rate v. paying the panel mfg sending the mesh to you ready to go.

There is no inherent savings in using panels, this is shop specific whether they are best fit.

Try both, see what feels good.  You can order panels with any mesh you like.

[alan802]

I've used bolt, shurloc panels and now the new sefar panels.  I've done the analysis on bolt versus panels and at our shop and our rate of busting screens, bolt is cheaper in the long run in cost versus time savings.  I LOVE the panels, they take me 3.5 minutes to have a screen stretched, flat, and off the roller master versus about 11 minutes on bolt mesh.  But bolt mesh is $4-7 versus the shurloc product $20-28.  My time is valuable, but not that valuable and I'm only stretching a few frames per week.  At our shop, the panels would have to be $15 per to make the investment even with bolt mesh, so until then, I'm sticking with bolt.

I totally agree with Peter, just starting out, bolt mesh is tough and stretching a few panels will get you used to the process and perhaps get you to see what proper corner softening looks like.  I never really had any issues from the start and the only times I've busted anything was from me trying to take the mesh beyond it's capability or one time I got some mesh that was mislabeled and I thought I was stretching 180 instead of 280.

Other issues I have with the panels is with the sefar, I'm stuck with whatever the "e" mesh counts are and to be totally honest, I don't like being forced to use a 156/64 when there are much better mesh counts to use in the 150 range.  I'll never use a 156/64 when I can use a 180/48, or even a 150/48 and although the sefar panels are a better price than shurloc, you are forced to make poor decisions on the mesh count you are using.  Shurloc will stretch whatever mesh you specify, but I've also ordered specifically and not gotten the mesh count I asked for.  It is rare, but it has happened 2 times in about 80 panels.  I had to look at the mesh through a loupe when I suspected it wasn't really what it was labeled and found it to not be correct to spec, at all.  You also are at the mercy of whoever made the panel in that they softened the corners correctly.  I've noticed the sefar panels are very tight in the corners and I'm wondering how these are going to hold up for retensioning.  I suspect that I'll be busting them when I retension because of the corners.  The 6 I put into production aren't work hardened yet so only time will tell on how they hold up.  The shurlocs have tended to be too soft in the corners but acceptable for the most part.

I doubt the panels will ever come down in price to where I need them to be, especially when they aren't having a hard time selling them at the ridiculous price they are now.   

[Logoman]

I have used Bolt and Panels. I love the Panels but the cost is steep, I have Newman Rollers and Chase Frames. I use Panels on the Chase  (don't like those blue sticks) and Bolt for Newman. I have gone as far as measuring my own mesh and sending it to Shur-Loc and had it put on Panels. The cost was around $8-10 each if my memory serves me today.

[Stinkhorn Press]

I bought 12 beat to hell Newmans off Craigslist, to give them a try.
Bought some shurloc panels so I had more room for error.
Didn't buy the special long unique size mag wrench, already had a torque wrench, bought an old cheap tension meter.

I hardly use them, mainly because I don't have a stretching table, and without one I'm not sure how anyone gets their frames to sit flat, no twisting. Need four arms and a perfectly flat surface (the mag wrench would help, but still).

[shurloc]

I've used bolt, shurloc panels and now the new sefar panels.  I've done the analysis on bolt versus panels and at our shop and our rate of busting screens, bolt is cheaper in the long run in cost versus time savings.  I LOVE the panels, they take me 3.5 minutes to have a screen stretched, flat, and off the roller master versus about 11 minutes on bolt mesh.  But bolt mesh is $4-7 versus the shurloc product $20-28.  My time is valuable, but not that valuable and I'm only stretching a few frames per week.  At our shop, the panels would have to be $15 per to make the investment even with bolt mesh, so until then, I'm sticking with bolt.

I totally agree with Peter, just starting out, bolt mesh is tough and stretching a few panels will get you used to the process and perhaps get you to see what proper corner softening looks like.  I never really had any issues from the start and the only times I've busted anything was from me trying to take the mesh beyond it's capability or one time I got some mesh that was mislabeled and I thought I was stretching 180 instead of 280.

Other issues I have with the panels is with the sefar, I'm stuck with whatever the "e" mesh counts are and to be totally honest, I don't like being forced to use a 156/64 when there are much better mesh counts to use in the 150 range.  I'll never use a 156/64 when I can use a 180/48, or even a 150/48 and although the sefar panels are a better price than shurloc, you are forced to make poor decisions on the mesh count you are using.  Shurloc will stretch whatever mesh you specify, but I've also ordered specifically and not gotten the mesh count I asked for.  It is rare, but it has happened 2 times in about 80 panels.  I had to look at the mesh through a loupe when I suspected it wasn't really what it was labeled and found it to not be correct to spec, at all.  You also are at the mercy of whoever made the panel in that they softened the corners correctly.  I've noticed the sefar panels are very tight in the corners and I'm wondering how these are going to hold up for retensioning.  I suspect that I'll be busting them when I retension because of the corners.  The 6 I put into production aren't work hardened yet so only time will tell on how they hold up.  The shurlocs have tended to be too soft in the corners but acceptable for the most part.

I doubt the panels will ever come down in price to where I need them to be, especially when they aren't having a hard time selling them at the ridiculous price they are now.

Hey there Alan, Ron from shur-loc here. Just saw the post about not getting the correct thread counts on some panels from us and would love to hear about what happend. As the one that does the final production step on 95% of the mesh that comes out of our facility, I'm very concerned that you received the wrong mesh. We have checks at 5 places along the way to make sure that the thread count and roll numbers match completely. I'm hoping you mean that you got a different manufacturer like a Saati 158 instead of a Sefar 156 or something, but their QA isn't even that close on thread counts so I'm not sure how you would be able to tell with a loop. Anyways, feel free to shoot me over an email (ron@shurloc.com) to explain the issue as we are always putting new controls in place to make sure that every product is as perfect as it can be.

Also, for those that are a bit scared off from panels due to the price, check out our E-con panels. They are made from a top manufacturers low elongation mesh, with the same laser cut precision as our premium fabrics - and now with color coded strips to boot! The E-con line can save as much as 40% off the regular panel pricing and are available for roller frames and the EZ frame line. You can see them here - http://shurloc.com/mm5/merchant.mvc?Screen=CTGY&Store_Code=SFS&Category_Code=SL1-PANEL-ECON as well as get pricing for your favorite counts. For example 23x31 M3 panels are priced from 83/100 at $16.50 to 305/34 at $19.50.

And @Logoman - yes the coversion pricing is usually in the $10-12 range depending on frame size...