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screen printing => Ink and Chemicals => Topic started by: blue moon on May 16, 2014, 03:02:17 PM
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so one thing coming up during the testing is the body of the ink. Is it long or short?
While I am not really certain yet if my thought process is right, here is an idea of why the short body prints better than the long. . .
So the question is, "Why do we prefer Short bodied inks?"
pierre
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Leaving for the weekend but short laymans answer is long bodied inks are more difficult to shear therefore often need to print slower. There are fixes for this of course.
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Can some one please explain the difference in a short body to a long body ink? And if you could also give some examples of inks and manufactures?
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Example that made sense to me was honey and cool whip--honey is long, cool whip is short.
How about tack?
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Leaving for the weekend but short laymans answer is long bodied inks are more difficult to shear therefore often need to print slower. There are fixes for this of course.
OK, so short body shears better. What does that mean to us and why?
pierre
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Example that made sense to me was honey and cool whip--honey is long, cool whip is short.
How about tack?
That is interesting so is Street fighter a short or long. It has alot more honey in it then it does cool whip. After it prints for a while it does start looking more like coolwhip. Im just confused now...good example of the difference that does help.
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Jon,
Is it the SF Low Bleed or Cotton White?
LB is "runnier" and the cotton is "shorter". We use both in the shop.
I can run at 40-50 speed on my Sportsman EXG using the Cotton SF when it's a good batch. If it gets to short, it will just climb the squeegee and never come back down. It will also slide out the sides of my wing floodbars.....
The benefit of a short bodied ink is it gives you the best micron for micron match of your film positive.
I.e. if you are printing a greyscale image, you will see very verrry little dot gain.
Shorter inks allow you to use less pressure to shear the ink, leaving more on top of the garment.
The "longer" "runnier" gloppier" the ink is, the less edge detail/crispness it will give you. Because it mushes onto your shirt, it does not shear.
The above print speed really only produces an acceptable print on good ringspun garments though. I used a 65/90/65 sharp blade - about 40 lbs pressure 16" wide blade. Angle is about 10 degrees for a bit more opacity. Mesh is 150/54? From Shurelock using their panel frames. Tension is around 30-34 newtons.
The standard PC61/Hanes/G200 etc are more difficult to print that fast on and Maintain a clean print with good fiber matte.
We almost always will use a roller frame/smoothing screen regardless of shirt type.
Here is a flip side to short bodied inks. MOST will also become to soft/pourable/have a large drop in centipose (cP). The more an ink can keep it's original viscosity, the better it can keep it's opacity.
This appears to happen more often WITH PRICIER INKS :)
When reviewing, please keep in mind the COST OF THE INK YOU ARE WORKING WITH :)
SF is a very very cheap white. It is made with Economy ingredients. Good economy ingredients, but economy nonetheless.
Hope this helps... back to work i go....
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Jon,
Is it the SF Low Bleed or Cotton White?
LB is "runnier" and the cotton is "shorter". We use both in the shop.
I can run at 40-50 speed on my Sportsman EXG using the Cotton SF when it's a good batch. If it gets to short, it will just climb the squeegee and never come back down. It will also slide out the sides of my wing floodbars.....
The benefit of a short bodied ink is it gives you the best micron for micron match of your film positive.
I.e. if you are printing a greyscale image, you will see very verrry little dot gain.
Shorter inks allow you to use less pressure to shear the ink, leaving more on top of the garment.
The "longer" "runnier" gloppier" the ink is, the less edge detail/crispness it will give you. Because it mushes onto your shirt, it does not shear.
The above print speed really only produces an acceptable print on good ringspun garments though. I used a 65/90/65 sharp blade - about 40 lbs pressure 16" wide blade. Angle is about 10 degrees for a bit more opacity. Mesh is 150/54? From Shurelock using their panel frames. Tension is around 30-34 newtons.
The standard PC61/Hanes/G200 etc are more difficult to print that fast on and Maintain a clean print with good fiber matte.
We almost always will use a roller frame/smoothing screen regardless of shirt type.
Here is a flip side to short bodied inks. MOST will also become to soft/pourable/have a large drop in centipose (cP). The more an ink can keep it's original viscosity, the better it can keep it's opacity.
This appears to happen more often WITH PRICIER INKS :)
When reviewing, please keep in mind the COST OF THE INK YOU ARE WORKING WITH :)
SF is a very very cheap white. It is made with Economy ingredients. Good economy ingredients, but economy nonetheless.
Hope this helps... back to work i go....
Great detail. Thanks. I am using the LB SF2. I used to use Wiflex quick but the price kept getting higher. Not that its not worth it but when I can get 10 gallons of SF for about the same price. They both do the job.
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Wilflex has a new warrior white, supposed to compete with Streetfighter.
I still prefer Xtreme. Prints great for us.
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Colin, we recently got a batch of the SF cotton white that is the worst squeegee climber
I've ever seen. Do you have any recommendations to remedy the situation? My employees
tell me to send it back...
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I haven't dwelled on this for some time however I defer to MCs article. I don't want to beat this to death but with regards to this topic we once again find ourselves mired in a sea of interdependent variables. I can only advise those that choose to so only change one variable at a time.
Otherwise we cannot truly collect and analyze accurate data.(Example change to s mesh and see what happens) I commend my friend Pierre in his endeavor. That is as much am I allowed to contribute
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That warrior white uses a duller white pigment and puffs a very large amount.... I dislike it :)
EB, the only way to change the rheology of a super short/thick ink is to add as liquid a component as possible.... this will quickly bring the stiffness down while still keeping the short properties.
Curable reducer/primer clear/fashion base etc...... I got some single gallons a few months ago - I was in a pinch and that's all they had - and all the gallons were like you describe. Too short bodied and thicker in rheology. It climbed the squeegee and crept out the sides of my winged flood bars. Forcing us to stop and scoop the ink back in front of the squeegee. If I am going to use it up, I will mix it in with a runnier white or just use it on the manual press.
Tony is correct. There are sooo many variables involved in defining the best white ink, and only some of them have to do with chemistry..... This is why I keep giving lots of details on my experiences and I ask for more details from people relating theirs...
Tony: I would love to see a day where you have no workplace/contract constraints on your comments and experience.
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Thanks Colin. To clarify, as Director of Ops and a senior manager of this company I am duty bound to post with restraint. I will always remain loyal to my company and it is simply the right thing to do.
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EB: FWIW, I've had great luck using halftone base to get white to flood well, it doesn't take much, (could be not even 1% by weight) and it doesn't seem to change the mat down or opacity--or at least, not enough for me to notice.
I keep thinking a straight plasticiser would be what you'd REALLY want, but I know how much that can screw around with cure/flash properties... not to mention what it does to how it prints.
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OK, so many good points, but I am going to try to reel this in and return to the less practical and more theoretical discussion.
We all keep saying it prints better and shears better, but what does that mean? The shearing is happening on the top of the screen and the print is underneath. That sounds like we are not really shearing it! Or are we?
Pierre
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I have found for us the right short body ink will sheer better & at a quicker speed. This means for us we can get a better fiber mat-down & as Colin stated letting the ink sit on top of the garment, resulting in better opacity.
I feel you can get the long body to do the same but with slower speed & sometimes higher pressure, or some modifications to make it less stringy/long bodied. I also feel that the long body inks have better opacity if you can get them to sit on top of the garment with low pressure. & I feel they have better bridging/stretch capabilities too.
Murphy37
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How would one test if the ink long or short bodied?
What about the fact that we are shearing on the top?
Pierre
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We all keep saying it prints better and shears better, but what does that mean? The shearing is happening on the top of the screen and the print is underneath. That sounds like we are not really shearing it! Or are we?
Depending on your print speed, you may be 'ejecting' it. (Someone will come up with who came up with that ;) )
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How would one test if the ink long or short bodied?
What about the fact that we are shearing on the top?
Pierre
I guess my hippie non technical way would be dip my spatula in the ink & if the string of ink follows me half way to the press, its long. If I pull my spatula out & it is more of a clean break its short. But I don't think that is the test you are talking about.
On the shearing, i guess I'm unsure what you mean by "on the top" are you saying that if the screen is flooded/primed with ink correctly you are shearing the ink from the screen instead of though the screen. Giving you the ability for less pressure & therefore needing less body?
Murphy37
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OK, so many good points, but I am going to try to reel this in and return to the less practical and more theoretical discussion.
We all keep saying it prints better and shears better, but what does that mean? The shearing is happening on the top of the screen and the print is underneath. That sounds like we are not really shearing it! Or are we?
Pierre
To share the ink is to apply force to the ink.. A low share is to stir, a high share is blade pressure applied as during a print stroke. A high share is needed to thin the ink to it's plastic viscosity level to allow the ink to flow into the mesh.
A "better" share will be indicative of an ink that flows readily with minimum- high share force..
A "better" printing ink will rapidly return to it's original body (it's relative viscosity) only after it exists the shirt side of the mesh opening and wets the shirt fibers and hold's the image shape.
How would one test if the ink long or short bodied?
What about the fact that we are shearing on the top?
Pierre
A long bodied ink will be stringy and will not want to separate.
A short bodied ink will separate easily.
A short bodied ink is preferable for better shearing and printing.
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I was thinking today about spaghetti on a fork while printing today.
If we are shearing with the squeegee, it means we are shearing at where the emulsion touches the squeegee. Which means there is an ink thickness from the mesh to the top of the emulsion. Now would this ink thickness be thick enough to give us ink release problem?
If it does for long bodied ink, wouldn't it be better to have a low EOM on the ink side of the screen, so the spaghetti ink is thin enough to just break apart.
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I was thinking today about spaghetti on a fork while printing today.
If we are shearing with the squeegee, it means we are shearing at where the emulsion touches the squeegee. Which means there is an ink thickness from the mesh to the top of the emulsion. Now would this ink thickness be thick enough to give us ink release problem?
If it does for long bodied ink, wouldn't it be better to have a low EOM on the ink side of the screen, so the spaghetti ink is thin enough to just break apart.
this is where I was going with the questions! After the shear, there is a layer left that still has the mesh embedded in it and after the squeegee leaves out of the way, the off contact makes the mesh move up and out of the ink deposit. This, it seems, is where the body of the ink comes into play. If it is long, the mesh will pull the ink apart and it will not release cleanly (long strings drawn from the mesh to the shirt). Short bodied ink will actually release (break off) quicker and should leave a cleaner deposit.
So what makes one ink short and another long?
pierre
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I was thinking today about spaghetti on a fork while printing today.
If we are shearing with the squeegee, it means we are shearing at where the emulsion touches the squeegee. Which means there is an ink thickness from the mesh to the top of the emulsion. Now would this ink thickness be thick enough to give us ink release problem?
If it does for long bodied ink, wouldn't it be better to have a low EOM on the ink side of the screen, so the spaghetti ink is thin enough to just break apart.
Getting the ink thin enough has to do with the amount of force applied to the ink to get it at it's fluid state. (It's plastic viscosity).
Your thought towards lower eom will suggest distance the ink has to travel to transfer (it's shortness ratio-how it resists flow) if it's too low then higher force will also have to be applied for transfer to occur but the ink may not hold it's shape once it's deposited on to the shirt.
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I'm trying to understand what makes it long or short.. Do you mean the ingredients? Or the measurement?
Is it the difference in too high or just right viscosity of the ink?
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I'm trying to understand what makes it long or short.. Do you mean the ingredients? Or the measurement.
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how about both?
pierre
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I was thinking today about spaghetti on a fork while printing today.
If we are shearing with the squeegee, it means we are shearing at where the emulsion touches the squeegee. Which means there is an ink thickness from the mesh to the top of the emulsion. Now would this ink thickness be thick enough to give us ink release problem?
If it does for long bodied ink, wouldn't it be better to have a low EOM on the ink side of the screen, so the spaghetti ink is thin enough to just break apart.
Getting the ink thin enough has to do with the amount of force applied to the ink to get it at it's fluid state. (It's plastic viscosity).
Your thought towards lower eom will suggest distance the ink has to travel to transfer (it's shortness ratio-how it resists flow) if it's too low then higher force will also have to be applied for transfer to occur but the ink may not hold it's shape once it's deposited on to the shirt.
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I think he was talking about the dimensional thickness rather than density thickness.
Which brings up another point, will the thinner deposit be longer or shorter than the thick deposit of the same ink?
pierre
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If the ink is deposited then it's at it's relative viscosity so it's just sitting there doing nothing. So how would there be a stress test reading on an already deposited ink? How would we test long vs short?
When the ink transfers into the mesh it retains it's fluid form while the blade's edge is still in contact with the mesh opening and only deposits onto the shirt when the mesh snap happens... So if the ink is clinging on mesh snap then that indicates that the ink is reverting back to it's relative viscosity too quickly- a reading of too high a value of a thixotropic index measurement.
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Seen the 'pulling the ink through' the screen trick.
How many people here can wipe a finger across the top of a white screen on the auto that's just pulled, and not pick up any ink? Not me.
Dynamics change a lot with speed and angle, not to mention viscosity and changes in it...
How about this: It's thixotropic, i.e. will stay put until you push it around, it would have as little tack as possible (under the circumstances with the pigment involved,) it will have a minimum of shear thickening, and all these properties will stay stable between 70-120 degrees.
Does this sound like what we are going for?
Sounds tough. I feel sorry for the ink guys. :)
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Pierre, after reading some of your post I see what your asking about whats going on at the bottom of the screen. From what I see it all depends on whats happen at the top..short body long body don't matter if the inks are not warm,correct squeegee, squeegee angle, print pressure, print speed, tight mesh, mesh count to me all that plays a big factor in how a ink will work. I would almost bet you and I could use the ink and it might be the root to boot in your shop and might print like crap in my shop from the way I set it up, I know all this still does not explain a long and short body ink and why it happens, but I know some inks print great for me and some don't.
Darryl
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Pierre, after reading some of your post I see what your asking about whats going on at the bottom of the screen. From what I see it all depends on whats happen at the top..short body long body don't matter if the inks are not warm,correct squeegee, squeegee angle, print pressure, print speed, tight mesh, mesh count to me all that plays a big factor in how a ink will work. I would almost bet you and I could use the ink and it might be the root to boot in your shop and might print like crap in my shop from the way I set it up, I know all this still does not explain a long and short body ink and why it happens, but I know some inks print great for me and some don't.
Darryl
Darryl, your comment is the reason I am down this path. Why should the inks print different????
My thinking is that if we take the lab readings on the inks and understand 99% of what is going on with them, we should ALL be able to set up our presses to get the most out of the ink. Without really understanding the ink properties we are all guessing what to do and how to print. We all find ways to make it happen, but I would rather understand the viscosity, density, tack and body and then go and set up the press to match those. I think if we truly understood those, we would all have the presses set up the same!!!
does that make sense?
pierre
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I think he was talking about the dimensional thickness rather than density thickness.
Which brings up another point, will the thinner deposit be longer or shorter than the thick deposit of the same ink?
pierre
Yes I was thinking about the dimensional thickness. A thinner diameter spaghetti is easier to break than a thick one.
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Pierre, after reading some of your post I see what your asking about whats going on at the bottom of the screen. From what I see it all depends on whats happen at the top..short body long body don't matter if the inks are not warm,correct squeegee, squeegee angle, print pressure, print speed, tight mesh, mesh count to me all that plays a big factor in how a ink will work. I would almost bet you and I could use the ink and it might be the root to boot in your shop and might print like crap in my shop from the way I set it up, I know all this still does not explain a long and short body ink and why it happens, but I know some inks print great for me and some don't.
Darryl
Darryl, your comment is the reason I am down this path. Why should the inks print different????
My thinking is that if we take the lab readings on the inks and understand 99% of what is going on with them, we should ALL be able to set up our presses to get the most out of the ink. Without really understanding the ink properties we are all guessing what to do and how to print. We all find ways to make it happen, but I would rather understand the viscosity, density, tack and body and then go and set up the press to match those. I think if we truly understood those, we would all have the presses set up the same!!!
does that make sense?
pierre
Certificate of Analysis.. We should be able to set up our production based on the ink's performance test that the manufacturers did or should be doing. We should not have to run these test ourselves and the supplier should no be accepting the inks from manufactures without a Certificate.. When someone has a problem, we should be asking well what is the value of (..... insert property here.) That way the problem can be pointed out with certainty.
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P, I understand what your after, but I don't think your going to get what your after just to much inbetween, climate is a big factor and shop condition where I might have air conditioning in my shop some might have bay doors and big fans blowing which I'm sure will play a big factor in how that ink prints in that shop. Hey if you get it nailed down I hope you share with the rest of us because you are right white ink has been a very difficult ink to pin down to just one really good general ink.
Darryl
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Another great aspect to DC printing as that, for the most part, all inks print the same so we don't have to spend time on this non-issue ;)
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Another great aspect to DC printing as that, for the most part, all inks print the same so we don't have to spend time on this non-issue ;)
Too bad you can't get all the different shirts to print the same, right?
I guess though, you fix one problem, you get another... ;)
Starchild reminds me about something I was going to mention before with the COA discussion--who has problems with the most expensive whites? Anyone paid over a hundred bucks for a gallon of something that printed like crap? I think a lot of the specs and lack of QC come down to market pressures--the demand for low prices is higher than the demand for consistency, whether it's the ink manufacturer, or the supplier cutting corners on AC in the warehouse...
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That warrior white uses a duller white pigment and puffs a very large amount.... I dislike it :)
EB, the only way to change the rheology of a super short/thick ink is to add as liquid a component as possible.... this will quickly bring the stiffness down while still keeping the short properties.
Thanks Colin and Foo. I figured as much on the reducer or base, just hoping there was an easier way.
I'm loathe to modify whites, particularly full fives.
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who has problems with the most expensive whites?
That's right on the money.
Nobody is going to provide a cert, testing, reliable tech data or any consistency at the prices of many of the white plasti inks discussed here. It's like cotton Ts- a mill can pony up for a specific USDA graded cotton every time and keep it consistent or they can use whatever is available and cheapest. I try not to complain that the kajillions of Tultex 0202 Ts we run through in a year are different every time because I know their goal is to provide the lowest cost ringspun (esque) cotton T on the market. If I took the same approach to ink I would expect the same fluctuations in raw materials and finished product.
If you're going to test, be aware that you may be working with a moving target with the more affordable inks.
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If you're going to test, be aware that you may be working with a moving target with the more affordable inks.
I don't think Pierre is testing a brand of ink as much the carataristics of a ink that makes it print well. I know it sounds like the same thing.
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That makes much more sense, learn how to work with all of it.
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Printers use more affordable inks in their operations and would get a better performance out of their production runs if they tune their setup to match the affordable inks rheological, optical and thermal properties.
I'm sure people have experienced the situation where one printer say this ink amazing and another printer tries the recommended ink and had less than stellar results.. Conclusion? Each priner set up is different and the environment of the location.. Well a press setup should be done around the ink, not just throw any ink into a press setup based on some default setting or on a past ink that performs well.
We should be able to get the same results from any ink at any print shop, summer, winter and humidity..
Put two comparable inks from two different manufacturers- Both inks are milled the same and sell at identical prices..
Ink Aa sells their ink with a cert and how to interpret their values.. Ink Bb sale pitch- IT'S AMAZING!!!
Which company will be more successful at selling their ink? Which ink will perfom better on most presses?
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The Ink that goes through the more open weave and has the better of the two press ops working with it will win......
There are soooooo many different shop production parameters out there it's ridiculous. I have sold drums of cheap white ink to shops that only run 110 mesh for their base plates and buy only on price.
I have sold white ink to shops that run 150-220 mesh for base plates and are VERY smart printers. They bought what worked best for them - It was not always the most expensive option!
Are you a contract house that prints on ringspun 40 singles? Or, crappy cheap shirts that look like they were made from cheesecloth?
Are you a retail house that can control its variables?
Again, I love what you are trying to do Pierre. You will net a lot of very valuable information for yourself!
Making a certificate about ink properties will do nothing if the print shops of the world are not using the same mesh/tension/squeegee blade/etc... to print with. They also need to have the same goals for print quality.
Will a "certificate" work with high end shops that have very experienced and knowledgeable printers? Yea, but they won't need it. They will stir the ink and know 90% of what it can do from that experience.
Will a cert help middle tier shops? I think more than half can benefit from it, but they need the staff to pull it off.
Honestly, instead of creating a cert.... Create a Youtube video giving close attention to the variables you need to control in order to create an amazing white print. Point out all the garment variables with prints showing the differences. Show that with different types of white ink, long bodied/short bodied/cotton/low bleed/ etc... Show what happens when you change your emulsion thickness.... show what happens when you use a more open mesh..... show different mesh counts and those variables... show a soft (60 or 65 Duro) squeegee Vs. a hard squeegee (70/90/70 or 75 Duro)..... Show a smoothing screen in usage and it's benefits on fibrous shirts....
If you are an ink company send out a link to that video, or create a cheap thumb drive to send out with every new ink purchase so the shop personel can learn something new....
Oh... and chemically..... if an ink company was to make a cert... it would ONLY be for an expensive ink. Cheap inks use components that are not always consistent. I have touched on this before....
My 2 cents during break time...
Again, Pierre, I love your drive to Learn and to create some standards within this industry!
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We should stop calling it Screenprinting and change the name to Chaos Theory!
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Printing Chaos?
Sounds about right to me! ;)
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We should be able to get the same results from any ink at any print shop, summer, winter and humidity..
I agree with this. It is not so much the ink then the control you have of your equipment. Lets face it alot of us suck at printing unless we have all the training wheels. (smoothing screens, lint screens, ink mixers, reducers, expensive forgiving inks, special flood bars and squeegees. All these things make our life's easier. The reason we have them is because we don't really understand the way our presses print. Why do we use these things? Well the reason is the same as the reason we don't all print award winning designs all day everyday. Time. We don't have time to set up a press to print perfect flat white ink with out using a smoothing screen, special mesh and special squeegees. We don't have time to truly learn our presses and the latitude of adjustments that we have with them. That takes too long. These band-aids give us a large window to be off on our abilities and still get a sell-able print.
Now back to the topic at hand. Will this study Pierre is putting a ton of time and money into benefit us? The answer is NO, in fact hell no. We maybe able to understand the study. We maybe able to try to duplicate the results with the same inks. But we will not give up our band-aids long enough to learn our presses to really benefit from the knowledge. Testing your inks is one step in the process. Next will be the right squeegee selection for that ink. Then the correct mesh, pressure, angle, flood and the speed setting of them. Any one of these setting can seriously change the performance of the perfect ink. How long will you really spend on the "perfect ink" before you say "this ink sucks".
I am not saying what Pierre is doing is not going to be beneficial. It will be but only to the people that already have control of their presses and time to learn to make the "perfect ink" work on their setups.
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You guys just said the same thing I told Pierre earlier in this post, but why don't we have the same problems with color inks, seem to me we never complain about the color inks unless its mixing ink color or DC.
Darryl
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Used Quick for years.
Then titanium dioxide went up two dollars a metric ton so of course Quick tripled in price.
We go through 2-3 fives of white a month. For ~$600 difference I'll deal with StreetFighters quirks.
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You guys just said the same thing I told Pierre earlier in this post, but why don't we have the same problems with color inks, seem to me we never complain about the color inks unless its mixing ink color or DC.
Darryl
Thats an easy one. We don't expect as much work out of color inks. Color inks we only print on light color shirts or over a "white" underbase on dark colors. White we expect to print on dark colors and cover perfect and do it smoothly. To even have a chance of doing this they pack a ton of pigment into white inks. So now we have a thick high pigment ink that we need to push through a mesh that in most cases needs to be higher than the ink is good at because we want to print super high detail prints.
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You guys just said the same thing I told Pierre earlier in this post, but why don't we have the same problems with color inks, seem to me we never complain about the color inks unless its mixing ink color or DC.
Darryl
You do not hear those of us that use Quick White complaining. Only a few that complain about the price tag. I bet if they go back and look at the cost on time spent F'ng with the SF2 they would see that the savings is not anywhere close to where they think it is. Not only do you have to factor that in but also the loss in quality of the print itself.
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I actually wish all our plastisol spot color printed like our white. The white's easier, more predictable and holds it's body correctly on the auto, the colors are often a pain in the ass, especially over a white base.
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Ahhhhh..... color......
you want correct color shade or opacity?
Shall we throw in the ability to print wet on wet too? :)
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I actually wish all our plastisol spot color printed like our white. The white's easier, more predictable and holds it's body correctly on the auto, the colors are often a pain in the ass, especially over a white base.
Ditto this plus the fact that whites print with much less pressure. Not sure what problems people are having with SF2 as it prints pretty easy for us. Just went through a 5er of it the past few days because we could not get Superior in time. Superior has been the best bang for the buck for us and the only aggravation is its squeegee climbing, but the much more expensive Tidy acted the same and did not give any better results with a much higher price tag. But again this is our shop with our variables so without laying all of that out this is probably not all that helpful.
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I actually wish all our plastisol spot color printed like our white. The white's easier, more predictable and holds it's body correctly on the auto, the colors are often a pain in the ass, especially over a white base.
That doesn't sound right. How much pressure are you printing your top colors with? What angle? What ink is it?
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I love printing white ink. We can print white ink faster than most of our colors and with less pressure. Since the VAST majority of our jobs require white ink as a standalone or underbase, I decided a long time ago I wasn't going to struggle with it anymore and tried my best to tame the wild beast. For the first few years it was not fun, as a matter of fact, it was hellish on some days.
THIN THREAD MESH
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I've been thinking about switching back to the superior because it gave us great results at a cheaper price but it wasn't near as consistent as the Tidy. All 60 gallons of the Tidy we've used have been identical and the superior had a few pails that were off from the standard which wasn't that big of a deal but the Tidy is one day away and $15 more per gallon and not a ton better but still a little more opacity and faster flash but almost the same matte down and print speeds.
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Ahhhhh..... color......
you want correct color shade or opacity?
Shall we throw in the ability to print wet on wet too? :)
I want it all.
I actually wish all our plastisol spot color printed like our white. The white's easier, more predictable and holds it's body correctly on the auto, the colors are often a pain in the ass, especially over a white base.
That doesn't sound right. How much pressure are you printing your top colors with? What angle? What ink is it?
Wilflex Epic. The standard base had rheology drop issues with automatic printing. I was warned about it by others and it's a b. when it happens. You'll be printing away and all of the sudden the opacity goes to hell b/c the ink thinned out. The Opaque Base appears to have solved this and we have some Amazing Base which specifically states that it's solved it but we haven't ran the amazing. I wish to god Wilflex would make a line of "Quick" spot colors that printed like the white or, better yet, a quick base. We try to mix our house colors that involve white with Quick as the main component in fact.
Back on topic, all I'm saying it that I find white plastisol ink easy to print, love having it on press. At least I do now considering all the thought that's gone into doing it. Like Alan and everyone it took a lot of study for me to lock down the right procedure that I could teach to our staff, it's still a work in progress getting the main points driven home to everyone. What Pierre is studying is very important for a shop that has the good looking white print but needs to do it faster in production I think, do I have that right? It's the next step I've been taking here and I'm slowing getting us there, re-teaching my lead printer how to get that fast stroke to clear, but I'm not changing inks unless I hit a wall with our current.
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Only used about 20-25 gallons of superior (small shop syndrome) so far and no bad batches yet. Were flashing today at 1 second and possibly could have sped it up but since the pallets were staying at 150 just ran with it so flashing has not been an issue. Did not spend much time with Tidy because after some tweaking it did not produce better results than Superior so we just used up the 5 we got and continued using Superior
White ink on dark shirts prints faster and with less pressure than colors on white shirts to get enough opacity. Colors on an underbase is a whole different story as you can really lighten the pressure and jack up the speeds. S Mesh and a little time and then cracking the white ink mystery changes everything. It helps when you print more white than anything else, so much so that we feel most confident in setting white up on press and knowing exactly how it will perform.