I haven't been printing full time recently, but I have been enjoying producing limited run shirts for retail sale. I want to offer discharge garments so I can avoid the issues of choosing thick or thin layer, with stretch additive or not, balancing fibrillation or cracking and really not wanting to tag the garments as wash first. I have a client that is driving most of that interest. Also, I don't want to annoy those adjacent to me with odors associated with standard ZFS discharge. So I was very interested in the Magna line of discharge bases and pc pigments when it was picked up by Nazdar.
I wanted to check out the Magna Mix software and the percentages/weights involved. I had some issues registering for a password so I e-mailed Mr. Walsh at SourceOne and I was pleasantly surprised at how quickly I received a response from both Mr. Walsh and his staff. They were kind enough to send me a starter kit of PC pigments and a gallon of ULF GA base. I just needed to purchase the Activator M.
Getting the Activator M was a bit more complicated than I expected. It is not just a regular Hazmat item, in that it won't ship UPS with a Hazmat fee. The material is labeled for spontaneous combustion. It has to go by truck. If you keep it dry and don't bake it you won't have a problem, but UPS isn't going to carry it. I dealt with a number of people at SourceOne. There was some miscommunication, but the essence of the matter is that no one could actually tell me what it would cost to ship the Activator M and clearly it isn't something that they have much experience with yet. I was told that the freight companies charge a 100 lb minimum, but what that would work out to I still don't know. It was loosely projected at $75 to $100 and that might have been reasonable ( compared to a 3 hour drive in LA traffic), but I finally realized that if I wanted to make this happen I would have to drive to the nearest supplier, SourceOne in Garden Grove. I took advantage of that trip to also pick up a blending base and an HO White. Until more Nazdar suppliers carry this product it may be a deciding issue if a screen printer is not close to one of the SourceOne locations. I am also sure that they will become more familiar with shipping the Activator.
The mixed and activated ink does have some direct smell. I only noticed it when I was right over the screen or when I put my nose to the container. It smelled like the polish I use on fiberglass or maybe a polycar wax. Not offensive or strong. The exhaust from dryer did not have any noticeable odor at all. The PC's mixed easily and well with the two bases I used. The ink was more creamy than runny and was very easy to print in my 5 color indexed sample at 185 ppi on 230 mesh. I had some pick up over my 100 pc run (and I'm slow), but didn't have to wipe the screens. I think I needed to have more faith and double stroke less! The ink discharged very well running at the slowest belt speed on my Advance Phoenix Turbo 30 infrared panel dryer with forced air. I had about a two minute dwell and an exit temp of 380. I've wash tested the results and they are impressive. I ran the hoodies through twice to make sure they were cured. Look forward to testing whether that is necessary when I have more time. I did have a little trouble with some ink drying in a screen at the upper corner. I think I just failed to flood it properly. The large 15 x 17.25 inch image made it a little difficult to manage my ink on screen. Screen opened right up with a little Aqua Wash from Fran Mar. I blocked out my reg marks with Kiwo Block Out WR and it had no problem holding up to the discharge ink and dried reasonably quickly.
I am really happy with the print. Great hand, excellent wash fastness and the easiest printing ink on hoodies (love the consistency of the discharge inks). I will say that the color matching was not quite dead on across all of the colors. My 424 mix came out a little blue. I imagine that part of the issue may be varability in garment discharge and deposition. I did buy a nice Ohaus scale that is accurate to .01 so I feel confident in my proportions. I did find the colors on shirt close and would consider them a good starting point, but I have to admit that I had more consistent results color matching with Mixo plastisol inks from Union ( a whole different thing than a discharge system). I'm sure I'll get more experience and feel more confident about color matching. It was encouraging.
Overlooking the issues regarding the Activator M and shipping this ink system has a lot to offer. For a small shop with close neighbors the lack of any major odors is a big issue. Not needing to be tagged as wash and wear is a plus with retail (though who wears a shirt that hasn't been washed? certainly not many printers who see what we get from the mills). My only problem is the amount of wasted ink, but that just goes with the discharge territory.
I've been enjoying following the forum. Learned a lot lurking while I worked on other projects and I'm still debating that step into an automatic. Thank you to everyone who contributes ( Yo frog!).
