S-Mesh Care

[ZooCity]

We run 90/71 up through 330/30 here and they all get de inked and dehazed (Franmar liquid D-Haze) with red scrubbies.  Is this wearing them out faster?  I couldn't say for sure.  I believe that blade and sometimes flood abrasion as well as ink knives and the constant, unrelenting blade pressure provided by our old Gauntlet are more likely culprits.

Soft sponge for degrease. 

All but 135/48 and 310/30 have an acceptable shop life with many lasting for what seems like an unreasonably long time given their delicacy. 

Mesh safe everything, everywhere, all the time is the key.

[ABuffington]

Some pads work ok.  Like I said, if it scratches the back of your hand it is sanding nicks into the threads.  Some pads are far softer than say a 3M Ozite pad.  Squeegee pressure is definitely something that will abrade the knuckles and mesh.  I found I can kick out the angle a little and use far less squeegee pressure to transfer inks.  This is especially true of discharge where a bit more angle helps reduce squeegee wear.  On older style heads I put landing pads of  Pelican tape to absorb the hard hit the mesh can take during printing or flooding.

[sqslabs]

Thanks for all the replies.  This forum, and its users, rock.

[ZooCity]

What's Pelican tape Alan? 

[ABuffington]

This is a cloth duct tape commonly used to protect roller frame channels.  Ir can resist some of the reclaiming processes with a stronger adhesives.
We used it on long runs, the only time it really needed, to provide a landing pad on either end for the squeegee and floodbar.  We also used rubber adhesive shipping tape with thin chipboard as well to disperse the impact that older pneumatic presses have.  We also placed them so that the floodbar and squeegee stroke never hit them along their path.  For short runs I use double shipping tape which is probably just as good as the pelican.  We libraried screens, so having semi permanent tape ready to go helped.  (Would never library screens today.  Good mesh is better reclaimed and used than sitting on a shelf.)

Al

[ZooCity]

Ah, I see.  Sounds like the stuff made by AWT that is a bear to get off used roller frames.  We use Intertape 510 (I think that's the stuff...) and for the super long DC runs we'll put a strip of the blue R-Tape where the squeegee starts the stroke as the Intertape will shatter off little shards of tape that get in the image area.