NBC EX mesh

[Rockers]

Anyone using this fine japanese mesh? Our distributer recommended it over the Murakami mesh as it is cheaper and comparable in strength and open area%. As a matter of fact their mesh has an even higher % of open area on comparable mesh counts then Murakami`s S mesh. And apparently it does not require any degreasing. But we will see about that. Will get some samples in next week and will share my results.

[abchung]

Thanks for posting.
They have an office in my country as well, I might try them out.

[alan802]

I've used their mesh under the Dynamesh name.  Dynamesh is owned by NBC and I've used a few yards of the Alpha series mesh and it was good.  It's right on par with Saati and Sefar and I'm pretty sure the 100/55 and 123/55 that I have is Dyna as well.  It's hard to remember which mesh I have since I've tried so many.  I know which manufacturer's mesh I have in house but I can't remember exactly which mesh counts are from which manufacturer.  The 100 and 123 I have is awesome mesh and I can take a look through my notes and find out exactly where it came from.  I've used Sefar, Saati, Murakami, Dyna and Accumesh and prefer the Murakami because it's hard to get the mesh counts that I really want (thinner thread) from the other manufacturers.  I've gotten thin thread mesh from other manufacturers besides Murakami but only because of someone I knew pulling some strings to get me the mesh counts I need. 

Most (all who don't sell Murakami) suppliers sell the completely wrong mesh counts that us textile printers should be using.  Consider the 156/64 as a very "popular" mesh sold in the states and when you compare printing that mesh to printing with a 150/48 or a 156/55 then you see it's a terrible choice.  Yet the 156/64 is all most print shops can get because their supplier doesn't carry the better mesh counts.  I refuse to let a supplier dictate what mesh counts I use in our shop.  I'm sure you guys could figure it out but follow the money, the mesh counts that are available from suppliers are probably the very cheapest to manufacture therefore they have become the most "popular".  STAND UP, DEMAND BETTER MESH COUNTS FROM YOUR SUPPLIERS SO WE CAN MOVE THIS INDUSTRY FORWARD!!!  110/81 sucks compared to a 110/71, 123/81 sucks compared to a 123/55, 195/55 sucks compared to a 200/48, 230/48 sucks compared to a 225/40...my .02

[IntegrityShirts]

I've used their mesh under the Dynamesh name.  Dynamesh is owned by NBC and I've used a few yards of the Alpha series mesh and it was good.  It's right on par with Saati and Sefar and I'm pretty sure the 100/55 and 123/55 that I have is Dyna as well.  It's hard to remember which mesh I have since I've tried so many.  I know which manufacturer's mesh I have in house but I can't remember exactly which mesh counts are from which manufacturer.  The 100 and 123 I have is awesome mesh and I can take a look through my notes and find out exactly where it came from.  I've used Sefar, Saati, Murakami, Dyna and Accumesh and prefer the Murakami because it's hard to get the mesh counts that I really want (thinner thread) from the other manufacturers.  I've gotten thin thread mesh from other manufacturers besides Murakami but only because of someone I knew pulling some strings to get me the mesh counts I need. 

Most (all who don't sell Murakami) suppliers sell the completely wrong mesh counts that us textile printers should be using.  Consider the 156/64 as a very "popular" mesh sold in the states and when you compare printing that mesh to printing with a 150/48 or a 156/55 then you see it's a terrible choice.  Yet the 156/64 is all most print shops can get because their supplier doesn't carry the better mesh counts.  I refuse to let a supplier dictate what mesh counts I use in our shop.  I'm sure you guys could figure it out but follow the money, the mesh counts that are available from suppliers are probably the very cheapest to manufacture therefore they have become the most "popular".  STAND UP, DEMAND BETTER MESH COUNTS FROM YOUR SUPPLIERS SO WE CAN MOVE THIS INDUSTRY FORWARD!!!  110/81 sucks compared to a 110/71, 123/81 sucks compared to a 123/55, 195/55 sucks compared to a 200/48, 230/48 sucks compared to a 225/40...my .02

lol Alan, preacher of the mesh.

I'd say most shops could get by with two mesh counts: 150/48 and 200/48

That said, I have a handful of 110/81 tensioned up tight that are good beater screens.  Print a little worse than 150's, but you don't have to treat them like glass!

[Rockers]

To make matters even worse NBC have one mesh selection chart that lists 3-4 different type of mesh they manufacture for textile printing. I spend a a fair amount of time to find the right mesh. Anyway I do look forward trying it out and comparing it to our roller mesh. To be honest I'm not 100% convinced about the roller mesh, it seems to be fairly inconsistent. And too expensive. The EX will cost us around $6 for a yard at 160 cm width.

[alan802]

I'm in a ranting type of mood today because we are closed and I'm sitting here waiting on UPS to deliver.  So guess what, y'all are just going to have to read it or turn the page.  I really hope those mesh suppliers who are taking advantage of us printers are reading this, I've been wanting to blow the lid off this travesty for a while now and I think it's time.  If you're a shop that likes the 110/81's, 156/64's etc and you make great prints without the excess work then more power to you, this advice isn't for you but rather for those shops that can't get the desired print they are after without double stroking and using revolver mode.  This is for those shops who are banging their head up against a wall every day because it takes them an hour to set up a 5 color job on dark shirts and then they have to run that job at 250-300 pieces an hour once they finally do have it looking decent.  Yesterday my printer left about 3 because he was sick, and we did a 5 color on red and royal shirts, 72 pieces in less than 20 minutes.  From the time the first screen was slid into the print head and the last shirt was loaded onto the dryer it was 20 minutes.  I used thin thread mesh on every screen except one and it was a 205 newman roller mesh for a top color.  Proper mesh count played a huge role in that job, the regi system helped a lot too but the fact is we didn't have to double stroke anything, we only had to do one test print to confirm proper registration and I did one more test print to get my pressures and speed right on each print head.  I'm not bragging because every shop out there could see those types of results if they wanted to, all the tools are available to them.  There are a bunch of shops who could have turned that 5 color job in even less time than we did and maybe even a few of those shops would be using standard mesh counts but they could have done it even faster if they used more suitable mesh counts.   

I understand why some shops "think" they can't use thin thread mesh, but trust me, the benefits far outweigh the alternative.  So you have to be a little bit more careful with them, well, you should be treating them all like thin planes of glass so a thin thread should last a long time in anyone's shop.  And if you decide that you'd rather double stroke and run revolver mode on every job rather than be careful when handling your screens then I don't know what to tell you.  I should have Tommy Boy come to your shop and hit you over the head with a tack hammer because you're a ______ if you'd rather run your press at 200-300 pieces an hour instead of 700-800.  I know there are many shops using standard thread mesh that don't use revolver and double stroke but probably half (I'd bet money that it's more than half) the automatic screen print shops out there are double stroking on a daily basis.  In the past month, I've visited 3 shops in my area to chat with friends and while I was at those shops, all 3 were double stroking during a production run on an automatic press.  2 were printing a white underbase with two strokes and the other was printing red, blue, black and green on a light tan shirt and all 4 screens were being double stroked.
 
If you are one of those shops that is double stroking daily, and using revolver mode when you know you shouldn't have to, then step up, try some thin thread mesh.  If your supplier says they don't have it, ask them nicely to accomodate your request, and if they can't, find someone who will.  There are suppliers out there that want your business and some that will do what it takes to make you happy.  Having to buy a certain mesh count because it's all the supplier offers is not something that should make shops happy.  If the suppliers carried the best mesh counts for printing on textiles it would be a completely different story, but they carry what makes them the most money (in my opinion).  I have been told by several, very knowledgeable guys in the industry that the mesh counts that are considered standard by our industry are simply the cheapest to manufacturer and therefore have the highest margins. 

If you try better mesh counts like thinner thread mesh, I'll tell you what's going to happen: You will not be double stroking, you'll not be using revolver mode for a stupid red design on black shirt.  You will be using far less pressure to print with, you will be printing faster, you'll be getting more opaque prints while using less ink, half the wear and tear on your mesh, squeegee blade and the entire press. And last but not least, your quality will be very high.  You'll be getting regular jobs out the door twice as fast if you stop double stroking and using revolver mode and god forbid if you're double stroking and using revolver mode on the same job (I'd have a heart attack if I saw that in person ).  Nobody has to admit anything here, but you know who you are if you're doing this, and it can stop if you want it to stop.  Don't let your "friendly" supplier cause you to use twice as much ink, and take twice as much time to print a job as it should, they are killing your profits and you have the power to change that.  They are making tons of money selling you screens that after 2-3 runs through production are nowhere near as good as they were brand new.  They are selling you a crap load of ink because it takes you 2-4 strokes of white ink to get a decent underbase, they are laughing all the way to the bank.  If you insist on using statics, at least use properly stretched ones with the right mesh counts.  They are out there, it can be done, but until our suppliers are forced to do something about it they'll just continue to do the same thing. Demand it from your supplier, don't buy what they say you have to buy.  If your screen supplier doesn't offer thin thread mesh, or a quality tensioned mesh count that you can work with, dump their ass and find someone who will accomodate you.  If one of your suppliers sells nothing but crap ink, you don't buy it do you?  No, you buy the stuff you like from someone else right?  Why should something as important as mesh count not be handled the same way?  The mesh we use is WAY more important than ink, emulsion, tape, etc., yet we don't just buy whatever our supplier carries when it comes to those items do we?  Hell no, we buy what works the best in our shop!!!  Mesh should be no different, it should be one of the most important decisions your shop makes when it comes to buying tools for doing the job.  I cannot stress enough how important proper mesh count is to maximizing profits and production, and not to mention the quality of the print.  A 23x31 screen might have $7 worth of mesh on it, and that screen could potentially print a million shirts.  It would take thousands of dollars worth of ink to print a million shirts, it would take thousands of labor hours to print a million shirts, yet how much was spent on mesh to print those million shirts?  Do you see the ROI and how little we spend on mesh yet what it's capable of providing us?  The price we have to pay for mesh versus what it is capable of doing for us is staggering so why buy mesh that doesn't do what we want it to do?  Even if that 23x31 screen had $100 worth of mesh on it, it would still provide a huge ROI over the course of a couple years.

Rockers, I'm sorry to hijack the S out of this thread, so maybe we should take this and make it into another thread about basic mesh selection or something?  My ranting doesn't have much to do with NBC mesh or Dynamesh so I do apologize but I had to get some things off my chest.  Frog, Dan, Pierre, do what you wish with this as long as it finds a good home that's not too hard to find, that's all that I ask.

If anyone would like to take this conversation private, you can always email me.  alan@srimonogramming.com.

[ScreenFoo]

As much as I agree with you, I could play a little devils advocate here--
I think they make a great 'silver bullet' type of screen, but they are extremely fragile compared to the regular meshes I run.  From the four 150S screens I've stretched and ran, I get the feeling I'd go from a screen or two popping a month to a screen or two popping a week.  As much as I'd love to see the effects of the mesh on press, the effects would be much larger on accounts payable and labor, so I can't do that.

The other rather cold reality at many shops I've been to and worked at is that it's believed to be cheaper to use cheap equipment, and pay people poor wages to stand there all day wasting time.  "It's worked for X number of years", etc. etc.  Not to agree--but to frame the mindset I and I'm sure many others are up against.  I am by no means saying I agree--but it's much easier for some lazy idiot to pop screens all the time and show me or someone else trying to improve pre-press I or they are "wrong" for trying something new than it is for a shop to take up new processes and really pay attention to what they're doing to equipment.  The other sad reality is how many people who make stencils who know little to nothing about how mesh count relates to a screen, much less thread diameter, tension, color, frame profile, etc.   

I'm not going to argue that thinner threads aren't great for print characteristics, and I'd never argue I wouldn't LIKE to switch over fully, but for handling, durability, and longevity, I think the standard thread screens are great--I can actually let other people touch them.

[alan802]

It is my opinion that if you stretch a screen, prep it correctly and put it into production and if it makes it through the run the first time without busting, then there is no reason why it shouldn't make it through 100 more times.  Now they do get holes in them easily if you bump it up against something, where as some mesh might withstand that same bump, but it's really not that hard to keep that from happening.  Our shop is no stranger to screens popping, that's for damn sure, but if the screen makes it through one time, that means it was stretched properly, corners softened right, protected with tape, etc. and it will take human error to make that mesh fail.  I've got notes on all of our busted mesh and we have not busted a 135/48 (one of the most delicate of the S threads) in almost a year, a few 150's have gone, but the stronger mesh, the 225/40 seems to bust more than the others have.

I'm all about the devil's advocate, I play that all the time so I do appreciate the other way to look at things.  Do you think that the S threads, more or less, spontaneously bust easier, without provocation than say the newman roller 205N?  I'm just so convinced that although the S thread is theoretically more delicate, it still takes human error to introduce a failure of any type.  I could be off in that assessment, wouldn't be the first time.

[BorisB]

To make matters even worse NBC have one mesh selection chart that lists 3-4 different type of mesh they manufacture for textile printing. I spend a a fair amount of time to find the right mesh. Anyway I do look forward trying it out and comparing it to our roller mesh. To be honest I'm not 100% convinced about the roller mesh, it seems to be fairly inconsistent. And too expensive. The EX will cost us around $6 for a yard at 160 cm width.

For over 10 years we use EX and LX, i think it's pretty good mesh, keeps tension rather well. But due to several reason, some were listed in Adam's rant, I developed rather nagging "multiple mesh brand syndrom". Currently using 5 brands. I an angry with myself about it.

Boris

[ScreenFoo]

It is my opinion that if you stretch a screen, prep it correctly and put it into production and if it makes it through the run the first time without busting, then there is no reason why it shouldn't make it through 100 more times.  Now they do get holes in them easily if you bump it up against something, where as some mesh might withstand that same bump, but it's really not that hard to keep that from happening.  Our shop is no stranger to screens popping, that's for damn sure, but if the screen makes it through one time, that means it was stretched properly, corners softened right, protected with tape, etc. and it will take human error to make that mesh fail.  I've got notes on all of our busted mesh and we have not busted a 135/48 (one of the most delicate of the S threads) in almost a year, a few 150's have gone, but the stronger mesh, the 225/40 seems to bust more than the others have.

I'm all about the devil's advocate, I play that all the time so I do appreciate the other way to look at things.  Do you think that the S threads, more or less, spontaneously bust easier, without provocation than say the newman roller 205N?  I'm just so convinced that although the S thread is theoretically more delicate, it still takes human error to introduce a failure of any type.  I could be off in that assessment, wouldn't be the first time.

Nope, you are right on IMHO--I think where the cost justification comes in is how MUCH abuse it takes to pop one.   Whereas when someone uses a brush with crap in it, and puts seven or eight micron scratches into each side of a 156/64, it's still stronger than a 150S.  When someone does that with a 150S, it's weaker than a 305/31 by the end of it.  The other thing to me about this is, you're abrading the mesh every time you print it--now, I'll agree in advance that less pressure=less wear, and maybe it's proportional between wear and pressure between threads.

Not exactly sure how it would relate impact wise, but I managed to pop a 150S by dinging the roller--no marks on the tape, no burr on the frame, etc.  I can find tell-tale marks on either the roller or tape whenever this happens with a standard thread mesh. 

I may have to get some more to try out, never know if there was damage on the mesh before I got it, and I'd hate to write them off without a good reason.  As I mentioned, I'll be keeping a couple around for problem stencils--there are some pretty cool things you can do with that mesh that are difficult or impossible with other counts.