Trade forum and mag 'advice'

[ScreenFoo]

I'm always intrigued by the amount of info I see that runs counter to what I've seen in production, especially considering how much of it comes from people who are not 'newbs', or at least not presented as such.  There is an amazing assortment of plausible ignorance about screens, whether it's stretching them, coating them, imaging them, or printing them, and it can be infuriating that some can do so many things wrong and do well, and others can do so much right but do poorly.  There are many dead ends I started exploring because of very convincing talk, and found only opportunity loss--but who knows what else I, (or they,) are doing wrong, or not realizing there was a missing key component. 

Even 'wrong' is such a poor term in such a huge field with so many possibilities, knowing some people with hundreds or thousands of dollars worth of equipment can do similar or better jobs than some with tens of thousands, or hundreds of thousands worth of equipment.  Even relatively simple subjects like tension get thrown around without consideration to ALL the parameters, which would likely take much too long to factually discuss for most printers.

After taking a break, (and realizing printing is way more fun than internetting ,)  I realized the vast majority of sources give advice that is either poor or is not necessarily beneficial to the printer asking, the best ones only do so only on accident not realizing how different someone's shop may be, and only the very very best realize have the ability to recognize they may be wrong, in or out of context, and be willing to give some other technique a fair shake.    An unusual status to achieve, or at least that would be the impression I get from what I read on these types of forums.

I tend to stick with my 'trade library' now, as I did long ago, realizing that even 'ancient' books like J Clarkes CWC, and Saati's tech fundamentals have more useful info than most 'printers' will ever truly understand.  I can't help but feel horribly for an increasing number of printers who seem to be ascertaining who is believable from who makes the most convincing arguments on-line.

How do you go about deciding if the advice you read on the net and in the trade mags sounds reasonable? 
How often do you spend good R&D time just to end up shrugging and going back to "How you've always done it"?

[Dottonedan]

You're right.  With any given advice, be is a seasoned pro trade mag guru or someone off the forums or facebook, A person can take sound advice, follow it to the tee, literately, and still come out with a different result. I've seen it happen time and time again just with my separations.  It all falls back to (what you really are doing) versus what is really described to do. That element can sometimes make a huge impact on results. Finding [/size]that something[/size], can be time consuming and costly.


I've been somewhat of a email and phone Tech/instructor well before M&R digital department with my separation business. My experiences then, are the same now with M&R Tech calls. Someone can describe what they are seeing, and doing, step by step...yet somewhere, they are missing an element, a step, a process or just not done identically as they say or believe it to be. Just like with separation tech calls, A picture or an art file says a lot.  When a customer sends in a print or an art file, often times, I can tell whats happening more so than a phone call. A video of the process they are using is also a key item to have in the conversation.


It all comes down to comprehension of what is being said clearly, and identifying what is being done clearly. I've had people swear up and down they are doing everything as laid out, only to find that they are not, they are missing a step. Now, I'll have to come clean and say, me too. I can remember some specific times where I swore I was correct or I swore I've done everything step by step...yet I didn't somewhere. I believed I was correct. I don't fight to be right with anyone. If I believe I am correct, I simply try to lay out the info as I see it and let them decide.  We know tho, that believing you are correct can be different than actually being correct. Getting people to realize this about themselves or a particular instance is a whole nutha thang.


I don't have a problem with being wrong myself, probably because I've been so accustom to being wrong early in my younger years. I know, it's ok that you were wrong and you move on with the new found information.


True indeed, I have seen a portion of an article here or there, that someone wrote and found fault with it (based on my experiences). Early in my years as an artist, attending seminars etc, I would get frustrated with what i thought was a waste of time getting cocky, by thinking, "I could teach that HIGH END class myself and didn't learn a thing". I didn't realize then in my youth, the class was a confirmation that I was at least doing what I should be doing and any small tid bit I learn is something I did't know before. I'd have to say tho, that as someone who's been around, I've seen hundreds of different shops over the years with all kinds of business models and art department operations. There is no real way (right way, or one way) to do things. It might be, in a controlled environment where you don't have any surprises, rushes, everything operating as planned and all of your employees do as they are told all the time. In other words, a perfect screen printers world.


I know that one thing can be dubbed "they way", yet is not always the best way in a particular shop given their unique situations. One might then say that those unique situations, those parameters must be changed to allow for correct operation of processes. Does it? I think you have to weigh the benefits of the improved process over cost and time in the other areas.


Now, as we all know, that the advice of one person, is just that. Advice. It's not a legal binding contract to where if the info they gave you freely on the internet or trade mags does not work for you, you cannot sue them for loss or damages. From the internet, you may get accurate advice or you may get some advice from a newb who thinks they know right now. Normally, someone will chime in with info that contradicts another. We all tend to go with the majority that seems to have a commonality.


Just remember that even the Guru's can say something you think it wrong, but that doesn't mean that what they say isn't true. It's just not been true for you and in your environment and screen print experiences.

[ScreenFoo]

You have a very interesting position as many consultants do, looking 'behind the curtain' as it may be with so many shops, as well as troubleshooting in many very different environments.

I agree 100% on the 'gurus', I absolutely did not mean to imply there aren't many people who really truly know what they are doing, but perhaps you are taking a different route--someone who's doing athletic prints exclusively will not be likely to be very interested in a lot of what Mark Coudray has to say, for example--but could certainly still pick up some great tips.

Some good perspective Dan, thanks.  I guess you put it well that a good path to follow is to realize things that used to seem like a good technique shouldn't be sacred, and most especially that paying attention to 'what changes what' will likely make the good process and theory useful.

One of the phrases I've heard more than a few times is "There are a million ways to print this", and I agree, but I also feel like I have to figure at least 999,000 of those ways aren't especially wise. 
The trick is figuring out the 'why' as it applies to 'where', right? 

[dirkdiggler]

nice points.  There is a shop close to me that does most things backwards and they are millionaires several times over, guess its your audience?

[Dottonedan]

I do think both audience (customer type) and quantity per order play a big role in profitability.

[3Deep]

Wow, good stuff and I can be one of those assbackards shops but without the cash , I look at it this way only us in this industry really put heart and soul into learning how to improve our methods, the paying customers could care less as long as they get some ink on there shirts.  Point I had a customer come to us gave them a price, joker down the street gave them a cheaper price and ended up needing us to help them on the job (now I don't think they knew the customer had came to us first) but that's just an example of a price shopper.  I will admit I've learned a lot from this forum and have try some of what was offered and still use, but also have went back to what works for us.  I've said this before many times how good can one print a shirt that will keep customers, unless it's some type of fade shirt people price shop large corps price shop, didn't Sbrem or Bimm just loss money from a bootleg and I know these two guys are very fine printers.  If I've learn nothing over these pass 10 years is dealing with the public is like having 3 or 4 college degrees, but you work at Mickey D's or Wal-mart they don't care about what you know and how you print, they just want a design printed on a shirt at a cheap price.

darryl

[Gilligan]

Darryl, a lot of what we strive to learn here and why we get the best tools for the job are to print those crappy shirts as hassle free and fast as we can.

We just did a Cub Scout job the other day... They brought in old shirt and it was a terrible one color "picture" of the wolf cub mascot.  It was awful two tone thing using the shirt for the second color.

I stopped my guy and said, lets half tone that guy out and make him look legit and pop off that shirt.  Sent them the proof, they loved it.  Printed with essentially zero hassle thanks to the proper tools and knowledge learned almost exclusively here.  Client loved it.

Now, maybe that customer may shop it around next year, but the next guy is gonna have a lot harder shirt to reproduce and they better do a good job, because we did!

[Frog]

Darryl, a lot of what we strive to learn here and why we get the best tools for the job are to print those crappy shirts as hassle free and fast as we can.

We just did a Cub Scout job the other day... They brought in old shirt and it was a terrible one color "picture" of the wolf cub mascot.  It was awful two tone thing using the shirt for the second color.

I stopped my guy and said, lets half tone that guy out and make him look legit and pop off that shirt.  Sent them the proof, they loved it.  Printed with essentially zero hassle thanks to the proper tools and knowledge learned almost exclusively here.  Client loved it.

Now, maybe that customer may shop it around next year, but the next guy is gonna have a lot harder shirt to reproduce and they better do a good job, because we did!

So Gilly, you got the approved artwork and okay from the BSA, right? 

here we go again...LOL

[Gilligan]

It was for a troop/troop function.

[Sbrem]

I was a production worker for a long time, and we had this argument with sales as to who was more important. Simply, without the sales, the finest printers in the world have nothing to do. A friend of mine once said to me, "just get the job, we'll figure out how to do it later." So, if you're one of those companies raking in the dough, imagine how much better you would be doing with all the efficiencies and processes in check?

Steve

[ABuffington]

This is quite true.  What I would tell an hand printer on a budget would not be what I would tell a 10 auto shop with bucks.
The internet is a source of Urban Myth as I would call it.  So many crazy ideas out there on how to do anything when shops do need to comply with basic
rules of printing.  To me exposure is one area that falls into Urban Myth.  Just because you make an image on a screen does not mean it is bullet proof.
Too many fall into a trap of trying lots of emulsions when the exposure unit is only capable of marginal exposure on any emulsion.  So we do struggle explaining how to get a good exposure under many, many different lamps and types.  Exposure time is one.  There is an optimum time for the type of emulsion, type of coating, mesh, and lamp available.  What would work in one shop may never work in another.  I focus on long runs screens.  Why?  They are as good as you can make them and you can't make it any better.  So when I run across shops that cut exposures to gain halftones it tells me many things about their shops that need fixing while a shop with a good light will have different issues.

Al

[blue moon]

I'm always intrigued by the amount of info I see that runs counter to what I've seen in production, especially considering how much of it comes from people who are not 'newbs', or at least not presented as such.  There is an amazing assortment of plausible ignorance about screens, whether it's stretching them, coating them, imaging them, or printing them, and it can be infuriating that some can do so many things wrong and do well, and others can do so much right but do poorly.  There are many dead ends I started exploring because of very convincing talk, and found only opportunity loss--but who knows what else I, (or they,) are doing wrong, or not realizing there was a missing key component. 

Even 'wrong' is such a poor term in such a huge field with so many possibilities, knowing some people with hundreds or thousands of dollars worth of equipment can do similar or better jobs than some with tens of thousands, or hundreds of thousands worth of equipment.  Even relatively simple subjects like tension get thrown around without consideration to ALL the parameters, which would likely take much too long to factually discuss for most printers.

After taking a break, (and realizing printing is way more fun than internetting ,)  I realized the vast majority of sources give advice that is either poor or is not necessarily beneficial to the printer asking, the best ones only do so only on accident not realizing how different someone's shop may be, and only the very very best realize have the ability to recognize they may be wrong, in or out of context, and be willing to give some other technique a fair shake.    An unusual status to achieve, or at least that would be the impression I get from what I read on these types of forums.

I tend to stick with my 'trade library' now, as I did long ago, realizing that even 'ancient' books like J Clarkes CWC, and Saati's tech fundamentals have more useful info than most 'printers' will ever truly understand.  I can't help but feel horribly for an increasing number of printers who seem to be ascertaining who is believable from who makes the most convincing arguments on-line.

How do you go about deciding if the advice you read on the net and in the trade mags sounds reasonable? 
How often do you spend good R&D time just to end up shrugging and going back to "How you've always done it"?

this has to be one of my all time favorite posts!!!! Thank you very much for spelling out in detail what I have failed to do before.

And now for another opinion if anybody is still around to read it. . .

Lets say we are able to print in laboratory conditions. everything can be measured, calibrated/adjusted and controlled. We can isolate the environment and make it perfect. Under those circumstances, it would be possible to find the BEST solution for screenprinting and it would be considered a gold standard.

Now, lets introduce a variable like humidity or ink temperature. It would make our BEST solution needing to be changed/adjusted so we can get best POSSIBLE results. We could not achieve the actual BEST results, but could be close with some adjustments. If we add another variable and for example use low tension screen, everything would shift again! There would still be a best POSSIBLE solution, which logic dictates would now be even further from the BEST solution. As we add these different circumstances/conditions/parameters, we will have to adjust mesh count, pressure and other settings to get the DESIRED results. The changes are stacking on top of each other just like the Pisa tower, if you continue building on what you have, you will keep going further away from where you could/should be going (in the tower's case that's straight up). This leaning tower is still usable, but is, in all reality, not a place I would inhabit! In my eyes, we should be striving for the BEST solution and try to stay as close as vertical as we can.

In many cases this pursuit is not possible (think printing waterbased inks in Arizona!) so some adjustment have to be made. But it is my firm belief/opinion, that we should strive to use as many as possible of the elements of the BEST practices as that will get us as close as it can be done to the best POSSIBLE results. This to me means, finding as much information about the BEST practices and trying to implement as many as I can make work. Great example was the my first CMYK job. The guy I hired to help (with 20 years of experience) said it had to be printed through a 230. I could see that the best of the best were using 305 mesh for it and fired the guy and figured out a way to print it with 305s. I did not accept the sub par solution and worked on it until this element of the BEST solution was finally working. Another example is our white ink printing. For years I asked around and tried to get our white to look better and print faster. It was incredibly frustrating not being able to get the answers and make it work. Some three to four years later we are pretty close. This only happened because I knew what we were doing was not the BEST solution but rather the only one we could see.

Going back to BEST practices, what they are and who to listen to. . . most things are measurable and instruments don't lie. I previously understood the viscosity drop concept, but never truly believed it until I bought a viscometer and actually saw it happen before my eyes. I know now that beyond a shadow of a doubt plastisol is thinner when printed faster! This is very counter intuitive and I have even encountered a chemist from a major ink company claiming that their inks don't do this (which was proved wrong when I measured their ink and it had one of the biggest drops in the industry!). People who's opinions I trust are the ones that actually measured (in some repeatable manner) what is being discussed. This does not make them right, it also does not mean they know what they are talking about, it just means we can have a conversation and be talking about the same things rather than some vague description (yes, I have tight screens! Is that tight for the rope and staples tight (7Nm) or Don Newman tight(100Nm)?). Just because I measured something it does not mean I know something, but I would venture to guess that going through the measuring process will reveal information not obvious to the naked eye and thus allow a deeper understanding of what is going on.

So, any advice that is backed up by measurements is advice worth thinking about and relating to your experiences. I would not take it as gospel, but I would list it as one of the most likely correct results. This is where I would concentrate and then try to get good advice. The pisser is, it might be the right advice and it might even be possible to implement it after a fierce struggle, but some times, even though it is the right answer, there will be other limiting factors preventing the implementation of the BEST solution. As you muscle through those and eventually build up more and more of the BEST practices/processes, it becomes easier and easier to correct the other ones or add new ones. Just think about that leaning tower, if you are building straight up, it is much easier to keep going straight up!

so for anybody not wanting to read through this, I'll sum it up:
-there are BEST practices and there a limiting factors to that which cause us to be limited to the best POSSIBLE practices.
-Even the best POSSIBLE practices will contain many of, if not most of, the actual BEST practices.
-more of the BEST practices we can implement, easier it will be to reach the best POSSIBLE practices and easier it will be to add elements of the BEST practices to our system.
-just because somebody knows what they are talking about, it does not make them correct with that particular point, but they are more likely to be right than the person who does not have the actual knowledge/understanding of the topic. (I have just mastered stating the obvious and making it look like I know what I am talking about!!!)
-You should be able to learn something from your R&D even if it is just that something is not working under the current conditions.

pierre

pierre

[ScreenFoo]

Pierre:  I'm still reading, great examples. 
Measurements do seem to be the most effective tool for finding the 'thread of truth' in your shop, as well as relating to others.
IIRC, last time I saw an SPTF process chart, there were over five hundred inter-related variables.  It's a lot to keep track of.
I'd also add something you and Al both seemed to be hinting at--the mesh, frame, and stencil make a necessary foundation, and once you mono-buttock that, there is really no way to do a great job--but many ways to do an 'acceptable' one, which may be just fine as far as the money is concerned.
I knew someone would have been in shoes extremely similar to, but not exactly, mine.  (and that's the problem! )

Al: Those with poor exposure lamps will suffer the consequence of poor screens while those with good lamps will find some other way of screwing up. 
I can agree with that from experience. 
But then out of curiosity, how do you sell long run screens to hand printers?  I mean, if they only have to get 36 impressions out of that screen with plastisol, will they ever want to drop thousands of dollars to improve their screens when they couldn't see the downside of the poor technique they're using? 

Steve:  I remember reading nearly the same sentiment from Bill Hood, although he quoted someone whose name I can't recall off hand.
On a related note, it's amazing how many sales we get from people who got something other than what they were promised--could be sales or production, so it seems to me that they can be equally powerful when it comes to making customers happy or getting customers irked.

3d and Gilly:  I'd make the argument that ANY customer has little issues with shirts and printing that you can make better for them, and they will usually thank you for it somehow--I think that's what G was hinting at.  In fact, that's really the gist of the thread's question--how do you figure out what really matters in the grand scheme of things, and once you know what you need to work on, how do you go about figuring out how to prioritize changes and print the best you can without wasting time?

I'm reminded of a quote from Pirsig:  "And what is good, Phaedrus, and what is not good—Need we ask anyone to tell us these things?"

As far as screen printing goes, no, but we could use some good suggestions every once in a while. 

[ABuffington]

ScreenFoo:

Actually hand printers comprise a huge percentage of the industry and our business.  The benefits of better screens?  Higher tension over the life of the screen.  You can library designs, complex sim process, and they will still print in register after storage.  Many companies print for bands and local businesses.  Librarying the screens cuts of hours of pre-press work since some of my customers would send the PO Thursday morning for shipment that evening.  Especially on multi color sim process jobs.  The print and tonals worked well the first time, and typically if you are in a band fulfillment mode shipping out product to the next venue, consistency and how fast you can print 200-300 pieces of 6 color sim process requires less set up time with the same set of screens used previously. Then there is S mesh.  Hand printers love this stuff.  So much easier to print with than 110T for bases and spot colors.

Advice is great if it works, each shop is quite different from the next, control and measure all you can.  The more you understand each variable the more accurate the print recipe becomes the second time around.  I have done consultation with a particular customer many times who is printing stacked high density inks.  The recipe is crucial, what is the pallet temp, the squeegee settings, flood settings, dwell, ink viscosity and so on.  With diligence to a print recipe this work would be repeatable.  For them it's reinventing the wheel every time.   That would be the key point I see in companies.  Press Operators assume they know how to set up the print.  Too many variables to just guess at.  I want to know the number of the squeegee, what side they used, A or B, what head, what pressure, what speed, what angle, off contact, tension, mesh and measure every single variable I can and document it.  I have a company in El Salvador.  They measure every screen for tension, thickness, exp time etc along with very detailed print recipes.  Once you dial in a 10 color sim process job and need to reprint it, getting pre-press to match the numbers saves a lot of downtime on press fussing with set up.

One key area that helped us set up and print better:  We numbered every pallet to it's matching arm, to it's matching press number.  We numbered every squeegee with an engraving tool and marked the A and B sides.  When a job went up the same pallet, same arm, same squeegee for that particular head saved tons of time on set up.  The recipe had the info.  Jobs printed extremely close to the original.  After X numbers of prints, the squeegee was replaced, a luxury for sure, but faster set up times easily paid for this expense.  The old squeegee blade went to hand sample squeegees and re-sharpened.

Making printing predictable is hard documentation.  We had to eliminate workers who just winged it and didn't check the recipe.  Set up times dropped by 50%.  We hit the 30-40 minute mark on complex 12 color sim process, which was down from the 2-4 hours without a detailed recipe.

Al



Al

[jsheridan]

Great post!

I'm a minority here in that ive worked in 40+ plus shops over my career and have seen it all. Ive learned along the way what works and doesnt work and apply those lessons to my daily life.

Ive also spent all my years reading and applying those lessons. Its the hands on part that taught me the most.