Sublimation Printers comments

[broadway]

  I will be buying a sublimation printer very shortly. Main reason is masks. Subbing out too much work and it is time to bring it in house . At first, mostly for masks, patches and trucker hats... I am not looking at cheap Epson with chip resetters like you see at Cobra inks. I have an Epson from Cobra for film and it has been ok.  Looking for comments on Sawgrass SG1000. The best thing about the SG100 is the print heads will self clean. Only drawback i see is the issue with ink cost. It can print on 13x19 sheets with tray adapter. The other choice is the Epson F570, 24" rolls. It is a designated sublimation printer and it comes with a lot of extras. Like 2 tools of paper, 2x the ink... You can also refill the ink no problem. On paper Epson is $700.00 more or so. But once you add in the extra ink... for the Sawgrass and it almost the same price. Inventory will soon be available with both printers.  Any thoughts greatly appreciated.

[im_mcguire]

  I will be buying a sublimation printer very shortly. Main reason is masks. Subbing out too much work and it is time to bring it in house . At first, mostly for masks, patches and trucker hats... I am not looking at cheap Epson with chip resetters like you see at Cobra inks. I have an Epson from Cobra for film and it has been ok.  Looking for comments on Sawgrass SG1000. The best thing about the SG100 is the print heads will self clean. Only drawback i see is the issue with ink cost. It can print on 13x19 sheets with tray adapter. The other choice is the Epson F570, 24" rolls. It is a designated sublimation printer and it comes with a lot of extras. Like 2 tools of paper, 2x the ink... You can also refill the ink no problem. On paper Epson is $700.00 more or so. But once you add in the extra ink... for the Sawgrass and it almost the same price. Inventory will soon be available with both printers.  Any thoughts greatly appreciated.

I am also looking into this as well.  But we are trying to find a good solution for sublimated transfers at the moment, until we can make sure we have the demand for the printer.

[zanegun08]

We have a Mutoh RJ-900 24" wide roll printer for sublimation, I believe the cost is higher than the ones you are referencing by about 5x.

I couldn't find the 24" on their site but we got it from here - http://www.inkjetbiz.com/mutoh-rj-900x-44-4-color-dye-sub-printer-p/p-002-rj-900x.htm for around $5k

I've sourced transfers from here previously https://mytransfersource.com/sublimation/

[Doug S]

We have the Epson F570 and bought it in December.  Honestly so far, it's been great.  It was setting idle for about a month and a half due to the covid and I was sure it would have clogged head problems but that wasn't an issue.  It prints great and the ink cost is low. 

I can't comment on durability yet but so far fantastic operation.

[ZooCity]

Do your math on the ink costs, disregard the printer's price tag.  Unless you have low throughput needs, you'll prob end up with Epson.  I think they have a desktop format model now, no brainer there imo. I'll probably get one soon for redundancy to our primary one.

We run an F6200.  Good machine.  3rd party service is an absolute drag, an injustice to these printers.  Wasatch RIP has an idiotic workflow and they like to charge you a few hundo or more anytime you have a question about the RIP but, after a deep dive into the profiles, it makes some damn fine prints. 

[ffokazak]

The Ricoh 3110 is a smaller print size, but damn those things are indestructible. Had one for over 7 years, maybe two clogged heads, and couple cleanings and they cleared right up. They make a 13x19 one as well, or used to.  By far the more durable inkjet ( its a gel printer I think. Not sure hat that means)

Great durability.

[Sbrem]

I picked up a Ricoh something about 5 years ago, and unfortunately the person/idiot I bought it from put it in a flimsy box and it was totaled by the time it arrived; and he didn't take the carts out either, ink absolutely everywhere. But here's the point, it was the "gel" ink, and it just stayed wet, after days in a box, and even after being open for days. The gel inks stay wet apparently, which I think would be why you only had 2 clogs over 7 years. I didn't try to replace it, but I would have gone Ricoh again because of that.

Steve