Preheating Pallets

[Jamie Christy]

What temperature is a good starting point for preheating? Can this be checked with an IR gun? Thanks

[ABuffington]

Yes an IR gun is an excellent tool.
160-190 F Max

[jvanick]

I'd shoot for 115 with your IR gun.. they'll warm up a bit more during printing...

[ABuffington]

You bring up a good point.  Pallets will continue to heat up.  160-190 is where plastisol will flash quickly and  hit the fastest indexing with the flashes on your press.  We started the presses up 15-20 minutes before the press workers arrived.  That way they could walk up to a running warmed up press and start loading shirts instantly.  Gains 200-500 shirts per day and more consistent prints than ramping up from a cold press with cold pallets.

 The other thing that affects this is the type of flash.  These temps assume you have quartz flashes that have very precise dwell times as opposed to infrared panels that have one temp and are on all the time.  They continue to heat up pallets past the max pallet temp causing ink to get cured in the screens.  At least with quartz flashes you can take a pallet reading as it exits the flash and fine tune the flash time to keep the pallet temps balanced. This takes time to regulate and measure the pallet temps.  We put a gun aimed permanently at the unload pallet to monitor the pallets all the time.  (Eats up batteries like crazy however, went to rechargeables!)

 3 flashes on a press gets into a danger zone where you can't keep the pallets from getting too hot.  Also times that work in cool morning conditions may be too hot for the warm afternoon.  That's why these IR guns come in handy.  If you see it climbing in temp above 190 it is getting way too hot.  Either lower the index dwell to speed up the index speed, or lower the flash dwell, or get a fan out and put it in the cool down head aimed right at the pallet.

[GraphicDisorder]

Our Challenger IIID has a pallet temp sensor, we set it at 100 (which you can change) and we click "pre heat" and the press preheats the pallets and beeps at you when they hit the temperature.  awesome feature. 

[whitewater]

Our Challenger IIID has a pallet temp sensor, we set it at 100 (which you can change) and we click "pre heat" and the press preheats the pallets and beeps at you when they hit the temperature.  awesome feature.

oh braggin'.... ;)

[GraphicDisorder]

Our Challenger IIID has a pallet temp sensor, we set it at 100 (which you can change) and we click "pre heat" and the press preheats the pallets and beeps at you when they hit the temperature.  awesome feature.

oh braggin'.... ;)

I'm just warming up.  Get it? 

[Matsui (PVC Free Inks)]

For Water Base we recommend 140 degrees Fahrenheit.

[tonypep]

I have never heated platens for WB and only partial flash for a DC/UB. Straight DC=no flash period no matter what the ambient temp/humidity. Side note: no additives other than water.

[brandon]

I have never heated platens for WB and only partial flash for a DC/UB. Straight DC=no flash period no matter what the ambient temp/humidity. Side note: no additives other than water.

If there was a "like" button I would be all over it haha.

Tony, just curious are you doing a partial flash for the DC/UB for "brightness" issue or an on press issue? We do not flash at all and do not have any problems. Then again we are not doing 30k print runs like you are either.

[tonypep]

Yes partial flash to pull out some of the water. The rest of magic happens in the water.

[brandon]

Yes partial flash to pull out some of the water. The rest of magic happens in the water.

Yup, magic water! I think printing WB is so much easier than plastisol in my opinion. And my clients and I prefer the results better as well. My new sales guy is coming in next week to learn/watch/help and get a better understanding of the process. He comes from a plastisol background. Looking forward to see his facial expressions

[tonypep]

That never gets old! BTW this 53 yr old stil has some skills left........3 color DC chest to 3 color nape+ 5 min per color changeover 2nd shirt perfect no triloc or pre-reg. Have to run a press today one of our ops is out and its beginning of season. Tip: On a lot of presses the simple step of dropping the platens (or print heads) and checking the reg a second time before inking saves a lot of time. This is often overlooked.

[3Deep]

That never gets old! BTW this 53 yr old stil has some skills left........3 color DC chest to 3 color nape+ 5 min per color changeover 2nd shirt perfect no triloc or pre-reg. Have to run a press today one of our ops is out and its beginning of season. Tip: On a lot of presses the simple step of dropping the platens (or print heads) and checking the reg a second time before inking saves a lot of time. This is often overlooked.

Not here I do it all the time, a second check before inking saves a ton of time, once ink is in there visibility drops 50% and I'm already dang near blind..

Darryl

[tonypep]

Its the old measure twice rule