Opportunity is missed by most people because it is dressed in overalls and looks like work. - Thomas Edison
incredibly slow it seems... even with a 60" belt, we'd have to run the press slow. Always something...
So, how long is a drying chamber that a shirt is in for 3 minutes? Because that would be about 3 feet per minute in our dryers with 10 foot boxes, incredibly slow it seems... even with a 60" belt, we'd have to run the press slow. Always something...Steve
Quote from: Sbrem on October 28, 2014, 04:14:01 PMSo, how long is a drying chamber that a shirt is in for 3 minutes? Because that would be about 3 feet per minute in our dryers with 10 foot boxes, incredibly slow it seems... even with a 60" belt, we'd have to run the press slow. Always something...SteveThat would be a belt speed of about "4" on our 16' Sprint. I agree, not realistic for most production even with the 60" belt and I would consider our dryer fairly large and beefed up. But that 3 minute figure is likely a cover thine ass when you see it in tech sheets as 3 minutes means a lot of different things in a lot of different dryers curing a lot of different print sizes with all sorts of different levels of penetration and ink deposit. If it's referring to the fact that 3 full minutes at a certain temp does something for the print in terms of heat setting the ink than I stand corrected. However I think that number is given to cover a wide variety of curing environments. Our dryer has more BTU and airflow/exchange than standard models so maybe our ideal retention time is actually lower, IR panel dryers with no airflow or adequate air exchange are on the complete other end of the spectrum. You just have to carefully test in the end. There is likely a point of diminishing returns for retention time and temp after which the print does not cure any better. Find it and I imagine you can up production and/or save on the utilities. Another interesting variable is the amount of binder in the wb ink mix. Rutland offers a wb base that's crazy cheap, something like $18 a gallon, but needs a serious cure. We skip it and go for the "quick cure" to keep things safe and ensure we can run as fast as we need but if you had an insane amount of curing capacity you could purchase or make wb and dc inks and run for half the price. Not sure where the trade off would be there with utilities v. ink cost.