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screen printing => Equipment => Topic started by: Logoman on May 27, 2013, 10:50:02 AM
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I have a Diamondback 6/8 Auto. When we are printing a job with say 4 colors when one head prints the other squeegees and flood bars chop which can uses a line impression of the Tees and sometimes will push the ink through the emulsion and print marks on the Tees.
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I have a Diamondback 6/8 Auto. When we are printing a job with say 4 colors when one head prints the other squeegees and flood bars chop which can uses a line impression of the Tees and sometimes will push the ink through the emulsion and print marks on the Tees.
... why don't you just pull out the squeegees and floods not being used ?
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I don't have a diamondback but my press does chop on all heads. I place 1 row of cheap packing tape on the underside so it creates a barrier between the emulsion and the platen. Directly underneath where the squeegee parks in the ready position. It has never broken through the tape. The basic packing tape from lowe's will blow right off during the reclaim without residue.
Forgot to do this for the first time in 2 years and had a breakthrough in 20 prints.
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We have a 9 color db, and yes the all heads cop sucks. Any head not in use, turn the air regulators to zero, send them all font, just in case you do have ink drop from a chopper its up to, easy to catch before getting out of hand. Never have a squeegee floodbar set in an out of use head. If ou have a problem with a chopper pushing ink through emulsion, you are too deep on you floodbarr setting, but always put a strip of tape on the screens where your you floods chop in case. Hope some of this helps.
Mike
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Maybe I'm not reading the original post correctly, but I have an 8/10 DB and I haven't experienced this issue. The only print heads that are operating (chopping) for me are the ones turned on for any particular print job...
What model year is your DB? Mine is a 2011.
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Maybe I'm not reading the original post correctly, but I have an 8/10 DB and I haven't experienced this issue. The only print heads that are operating (chopping) for me are the ones turned on for any particular print job...
What model year is your DB? Mine is a 2011.
Your's is a new model and only chops the heads in use, older models chopped all heads all the time.
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move the squeegee past the total print, don't let it stop on the print on the shirt...problem solved.
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Maybe I'm not reading the original post correctly, but I have an 8/10 DB and I haven't experienced this issue. The only print heads that are operating (chopping) for me are the ones turned on for any particular print job...
What model year is your DB? Mine is a 2011.
Your's is a new model and only chops the heads in use, older models chopped all heads all the time.
Thanks chubsetc...I thought it might be a model year difference. ;)
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Not to knock the DB, but you would think that they would have fix that long time ago, my 2007 Anatol only chopped the heads I turned on...that would have drove me crazy with all the heads chopping even though they were not in use. I guess that was a cost cut maybe on M&R's part...
Darryl
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yeah ours is an 07, all heads, always chop, really sucks. And you are correct, in saying, if you have a multi color job on deck, make sure all your squeegees totally clear the full design, even if one is only printed a small or upper part of the design, it will chop and possibly leave a line in your image so we always make sure to have every print carriage clear the total image area to prevent a possibly pain in the tail. Nice that the newer models only chop on active heads, but at the time, it was the price we had to pay to have 9 colors for around 30k
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Wow, I can't believe that. Our old gauntlet doesn't even do this although it does leave constant squeegee pressure on the screen which can be a similar hassle.
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Cant you install manual shut off valves inline and shut them off on heads that are not printing?
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I'm sure there should be a mod that can be done, would be nice, but for me, I can't stand seeing the empty choppers smacking around giving them selves un-necessary wear and tear. Like swinging at the open air, eventually something will throw it's self out and could be avoided if it was just deactivated until needed. At the time though, I didn't know the difference and was just so wanting to put the squeegee down.
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ask rich, there should be a switch you can put in that will dump the pressure to the choppers.
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First DB I saw at a show was chopping on all heads and I assumed it was for demonstration purposes and when they started the print job I saw they were still chopping and asked the operator why he didn't turn those heads off. He told me it was just something the DB's did to keep the cost down. Those entry level machines are very cost driven and I suppose the addition of parts to stop the chopping would have added a significant amount to the price of the press. I personally don't see how that could be that expensive but I also don't build autos for a living so I'm not an expert.
I remember the first time I saw a press in person that had the squeegee pressure in the down position at all times was Eric's shop in Houston. At the time I was still operating the American Centurian but I couldn't wrap my head around why the press did that and it sure made setting up a simple job 10 times harder than what I was used to. Hard to say I was spoiled by a 90' model centurian but I guess I was. I've learned a lot about the different autos since then but not really from a deep engineering standpoint. I mostly just know the features and differences at the printer's level between manufacturers but the old challengers and gauntlets always troubled me with the print head pressure constant. Hard to argue with the success though, and the fact that so many millions of unbelievable prints (and bad ones) came off of those machines. They were not easy to set up jobs on but once you got them going very little stopped them.
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Our Diamondback has it too.
Good news is that 95% of our prints are all done in 1 pass 1 revolution. 3-4% that are revolved are usually just the same screen hit 2x, then the last 1-2% the squeegee will be going down on the shirt for one or two screens but doesn't tend to mark the shirt. One key with not marking the shirt is higher tension screens. Makes it so the shirt ends up getting less of the pressure.
And I don't change pressure in unused heads to 0 because then the flood choppers go insane. Definitely don't leave squeegees in screens not being used for the job though.
It was a corner cut to drive cost down 1-2k tops that's just shouldn't have been cut, not worth the misprints / shoot outs / extra tape / slow downs.
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that's odd, our flood chopper is not affected at all by the pressure regulator only the squeegee, maybe as they developed the DB, some changes were made. It was actually Rich here in person who told me, at least for ours, unused heads, turn off the pressure to the squeegee, also set the squeegee chopper to max depth and just control it with the air pressure, we have had it like that for the past 5 years since he came and instructed us, it was alot easier to control instead of batteling depth vs pressure ect. Our's also only has 3 feet at the base, some people have 4 feet, so I think there has definately been a slow evolution of the machine since it was released. I don't mean to sound like I'm knocking the DB in past posts, because with entry level pricing comes entry level features and function, when we got into ours, it was to get the squeegee out of my hand and the DB has taken us way past that. Now that I know a ton more about autos, I know the features I want in the next machine, but I would still recommend the DB to people looking for a rock solid machine that can make your shop a ton of money. Our DB, married up with Tri Lock and the I-Image CTS, we can set up flawless 8 color spot, or sim process jobs and be in production under an hours time easy. If we are starting off with clean un-inked squeegees and floods, more around the 30 min time, screens loaded, locked in, squeegees/floods, dump the ink, and go right into test print mode. I can only imagine how much faster on other models, but honestly, nobody is running around their press like you see in some videos, that's dangerous and not realistic. The DB, with 2 people can easily produce, at it's max image size, with proper seps, and ink viscosities, single strokes, within the 30-40 dozen an hour range, which is a very respectable speed to run "quality" jobs. If you are stuck way lower than that in your output with DB, no problem, just over time perfect your seps, and fine tune your mesh counts, you can find that the machine will easily produce serious money for you, and the dam thing will run all day and night issue free, I know ours does. We go back and forth about it, but honestly, since it's paid for, when we are ready, we will keep it because we know it's capabilities and ease of training to run it, and just add another machine with larger capacity, "when the time is right". If you are double stroking, you should look into your mesh counts, consider going with retention-able frames, and modify ink viscosities, it's rare that you should ever need to double stroke if you are dialed in right, if you do have to, make sure you keep your table in the up position, it will add alot of speed keeping the table up for multi strokes, just watch your flood depth, incase your pallets are creeping up into the screen ect. All in all, the DB was and still is the hottest selling entry level press because you can pull off a ton of production with it and grow your shop into a higher end model.
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just ran a job today on my DB 54 dozen hr. full size back.
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just ran a job today on my DB 54 dozen hr. full size back.
what year / how?
perhaps our index air line should be opened up to speed up the index? Liked I said we get 52-53dz/hr dry cycling
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I'm going to ask a crazy question here, but has any one actually but a real time clock on this 54 doz per hour etc. I know for one the dryer has to be able to out put at a higher rate than the press can print which then you can fly, but back to what I was asking. I did this on our press cuz I know our press tells me how many I should be able to print in such and such time...it was close, and I think that's all it's meant to be is close.
Darryl
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D, we did 52 dz an hour with our DB, left chest, 6 color print, ran it for an hour exactly, then my wife said, dude, you are going to wreck your back slow it down, now, if the design permits, 40 dz is the pace we try to average, but most bigger designs, say 15x 17 or so run around 30 dz, " actual counted output". The m&r counter is very accurate, I can say that for sure. Not sure about everyone else here, but we are not in a race , we want quality, if the output slows down a tad to keep a critical eye out, then so be it. Especially loading straight, anyone trying to run long runs, 16" wide pallets and loading 2xl, 3xl, and 4 xl shirts, which we do alot of, will for sure have some crooked or miss aligned prints, quality, quality, quality. 30 dz per hour is still a respectable pace in my book, for 1 machine, 1 operator, put 2 people in the mix and you can pace with 40 easy and still hold a high standard. I think any way, but who the heck am I right, lol :o
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Screen, I think that's the main problem the machine can go and go and go, but we can't at least I know I can't, I can only hang for so long before I have to take a break, and then my dryer really slows me down also...by the way I hate printing tents too 4x 5x 6x it's like tossing a blanket over the press LOL
Darryl
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Our press doesn't have production numbers but I watch how many indexes goes by in a minute then figure it out in my head.
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Screen, I think that's the main problem the machine can go and go and go, but we can't at least I know I can't, I can only hang for so long before I have to take a break, and then my dryer really slows me down also...by the way I hate printing tents too 4x 5x 6x it's like tossing a blanket over the press LOL
Darryl
Tents!! That's awesome!!! My wife yells for me to come over and print them when she gets to them, hates it. I try to have 18" wide pallets on when I know there will be alot of them, but even with those, they slow ya down.