TSB
screen printing => Equipment => Topic started by: Dottonedan on November 22, 2016, 09:27:55 AM
-
Out of curiosity, where is the off contact adjustment on your press? It is a lever arm, or button feature?
-
M&R: Lever under the carousel.
-
Yes, I should have clarified, other than M&R presses. Lol.
Thanks for the reminder.
-
Workhorse Sabre has them under the carousel at the center shaft.
-
are you talking about where you adjust it?
On the RPM it can be done from any head in by pressing a few buttons.
-
On my Anatol I have a central off contact knob under the table, here is another question while we are on this subject what's better central off contact adjustment or independant head adjustment off contact?
-
individual adjustments on the front and back of the screen holders. . .
pierre
-
Interesting. We see that this can be pretty different on each.
How often are you all making adjustments? So far, this shop does not touch off contact but they jump around from really thick sweats to thin fitness wear.
-
I like the idea of central off contact to adjust for garment issues and shims to adjust an individual print head OC and peel for special effect ink.
By combining shims of varying thickness you have almost infinite OC control. A trip to the hardware store to get 1 inch aluminum blanks in 1/64, 1/32, 1/16 & 1/8th thickness. Cut to length of your screen holders and if you want to get fancy spray paint to color code for thickness.
-
I like the idea of central off contact to adjust for garment issues and shims to adjust an individual print head OC and peel for special effect ink.
By combining shims of varying thickness you have almost infinite OC control. A trip to the hardware store to get 1 inch aluminum blanks in 1/64, 1/32, 1/16 & 1/8th thickness. Cut to length of your screen holders and if you want to get fancy spray paint to color code for thickness.
I agree 100%...
I can't see any good reason to adjust off contact independently front to back or left to right on a head in a production environment....
-
Remember that you will also need to adjust flood and squeegee pressures if you shim
-
Shimming means re-setting screens correct? As in switching from tees to fleece you unlock head insert
shim and re-set?
No thanks.
-
On my press I set the central off contact and I'm good to go for sweats, hoodies, tee's etc...don't ever remember shimming an individual screen for any reason, maybe setting the squeegee pressure different. @ Dan they must not have run into some thick sweats or hoodies yet, I can see registration problems using the same OC setting for T's and thick sweats, at least I know it has for me.
-
Optimal o.c. adjustment would be central + individual at heads but only in plane, i.e. no option to make left higher than right or front higher than back.
I like central for quick T to fleece adjustment.
I like individual for jobs with DC UB, etc. that can benefit from dialing in o.c. It'd be nice to have the hilite colors after a heavy ub up a little further, etc.
We use shims on our old gauntlet.
-
Roq You
Individual adjustments on the front and back of the screen holders.
They are manual adjust. I would prefer a digital adjust. And we do adjust flood and squeegee height depending on the change. In a perfect world we would also have central off contact as well. Switching from tees to hoodies would be great if we could just make one adjustment and not have to worry about anything else. But having to choose between one or the other, I will take independent head OC over central any day.
We use different OC on hoodies than we do tees. And as we've been testing different white inks we have done some a little higher than top colors. I suppose if we had a screen where the tension got a little loose we would raise the OC a little higher on that screen as well.
-
With regards to M&R macs it varies from older models to new FYI. That said, central works and has worked for many if not most, with the occasional shim on the PLS/UB; as the viscosity/rheology of, for instance, a high viscosity long shear ink may require more time to release than a low viscosity short shear. Confused? I won't mislead you by telling you not to be. For instance, a slightly slower, longer print stroke can often achieve desired results without adjusting the off contact or double stroke. Did I not mention mesh count selection, squeegee selection/parameters, and how they all affect eachother? Its all about the release of the ink to substrate (assuming cure issues are under control). Think of it in three parts...
the ink, the transfer mechanism (screen) and the substrate. If all those parameters are dialed in then your life shall be simple.
Guess I may have an article to write after all
-
A central off contact is nice, the added bonus is individual head adjustment. Not a fan of shims as already mentioned comments of squeegee pressure and floodbar adjustment are just more variables floating around in my head that I can forget about.
Working on a sporty right now and today alone I was under that machine twice flipping the lever.
-
this is actually one feature that Anatol really got right on the volt.... digitally controllable from the operator panel central off contact. Do any other presses have that?
-
this is actually one feature that Anatol really got right on the volt.... digitally controllable from the operator panel central off contact. Do any other presses have that?
I think the new RPM's do or any with the panel upgrade. You can change ours from each head electronically. Honestly taking 2 steps over to the head isn't a big deal since you can't adjust it while printing anyway.
I wish I could adjust the flash from the main panel, that gets old fast.
-
I have used all of the above. I do feel individual head adjustment are nice at times. But it's much quicker to go from tee's to fleece with a central off contact, as I don't have to run around the press adjusting all 6-8 heads, just one movement and they are all done. On newer presses with the central off contact the only time I could see a need for shims is if using a jig or some specialty inks with other inks needing to be set at normal off contact.
I agree with Zoo, both would be optimal. But with more employees the risk of individual head off contact you run a higher risk of things getting a little hairy if people are moving them and not adjusting them back.
Murphy
-
@Dan. I have seen it where a shop is using a deeper off contact as a default so they don't need to think about adjusting the off contact when moving from tee's to fleece. I'm personally not a fan of this, but I guess I get it?
Murphy
-
I have used all of the above. I do feel individual head adjustment are nice at times. But it's much quicker to go from tee's to fleece with a central off contact, as I don't have to run around the press adjusting all 6-8 heads, just one movement and they are all done. On newer presses with the central off contact the only time I could see a need for shims is if using a jig or some specialty inks with other inks needing to be set at normal off contact.
I agree with Zoo, both would be optimal. But with more employees the risk of individual head off contact you run a higher risk of things getting a little hairy if people are moving them and not adjusting them back.
Murphy
That is exactly what happens. we had both on the presses for a short time and QUICKLY realized how bad a customer can screw up the entire off contact on a press. It needs to be either or but not both.
-
Agreed that press ops might fudge up the individual o.c. definite risk there in any shop. Digital would solve that issue, one button reset at panel. Or simple detent knobs and maybe visual reference.
Sent from my SM-G900V using Tapatalk
-
this is actually one feature that Anatol really got right on the volt.... digitally controllable from the operator panel central off contact. Do any other presses have that?
Another plus on the Anatol machines is levels of OC they have, I can't say about other machines but I know I have plenty of OC settings 0 to 3/8
-
Workhorse Sabre is central on shaft 3 differnt offset presets.works like a charm. Easy to change from tees to hoodies ( we do a lot of hoodies in south Texas )