All in one press/dryer?

[RICK STEFANICK]

One thing you could do is flash dry shirts, stack them and then finish curing
with a hot press. This way you can get by with one 20A 110 outlet if you
only have the flash or hot press on one at a time.

Good point but that's totally inefficient it wont make money and he will get frustrated after running a real operation.

[Prince Art]

What are the drawbacks to low cure additives besides probably not a great idea when it's 110 degrees in the shop I would imagine. Any issues with durability etc?.

International Coatings has a low cure additive that will get you down to about 300 cure temp. We use it, works well. If there's another brand of this product, I'd like to know. This is the only one I've found.

ELT & ELT-S from One Stroke get you down to 280 degrees. We use a lot of ELT-S white, and it's great. No durability problems, great stretch, good hand. The only quibble I have is that it make our screens harder to reclaim. Still don't know why or what to do about. But obviously, we do reclaim them or we wouldn't still be using the ink.

thinking outside the box here, I wouldn't be bothered by any of this. I remember working in a small confined area and it was brutal. I would invest my money in 2 or 3 really nice heat presses, get set up with a decent transfer supplier and go that route. No press, no dryer, no inks, no chemicals. On top of that, find a quality contract shop and send out the large orders. Focus on selling, not printing.

I like this idea. I always told myself if I ever went back to a home operation, I'd probably ditch screen printing and just do a nice DTG setup and find a niche. Might be my retirement plan lol.

I don't know if I'd do this or not, but I have to agree it was the first idea I thought of when you described your situation!

[Prince Art]

Saw a great dryer made for DTG.
Looks like a chest of drawers.
The draws had a metal screen base and it had hot air circulating through the draws.
You lay a shirt in a draw and let it cure, no moving belt.
This system can cure plastisol, water base and discharge.
Also compact, the draws need to be the size of a shirt.

Maxie, do you have a link to this, or a name? I'm curious, would like to learn more about it.

[Prosperi-Tees]

Now Homer has my wheels turning. Anyone know of a good fast turn transfer company? I would think it would need to be on the left coast for 1-2 day shipping.

[Nation03]

www.thewildside.com

Not sure how their turnaround time is, but they're in California.

[Maxie]

I think it was made by a Italian company for Kornit to use with a digital printer.    I'll check with them.
The idea is great, you don't need a conveyor printer if you are doing small amounts, you could put shirts into a kitchen oven if it was big enough.
When I first started I had access to a oven that was used for heating chrome plated metal, I used to hang the shirts on racks and drop them into the oven for 5 minutes.
You could make a heated box and put shirts in on hangers, all they need is to get to the right temperature and for DTG and water base also for the right amount of time.