Author Topic: Next Question. What  (Read 2302 times)

Offline Printficient

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Next Question. What
« on: June 24, 2015, 08:20:12 AM »
What equipment do you have and in what order did you get it.  Also, of course, why?  Not talking about presses as we all know what happens when we do.  Everything else is fair game.  Software as well.
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Offline jvanick

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Re: Next Question. What
« Reply #1 on: June 24, 2015, 09:09:08 AM »
I'll play:

Here's our progression which picks up right after the halogen worklamp and early 'ryonet' days and in rough order over a period of the last 6 years...

(Already had Adobe Creative Suite due to other needs)

Started with homemade FL unit... no vacuum hold down.
Stouffer Strip and Chromaline Exposure Calc
IR Temp Gun
Little Buddy conveyor
Atkins Probe (everybody said to buy one LOL)
Epson 1400 film printer & Accurip (outgrew HP 8.5x11 printer and wanted to print better halftones)
Vinyl Cutter and Heat Press (requests for #'s and names)
Harbor Freight Scale for rough measurements of ink (started doing discharge)
Mercury conveyor


---> Outgrew basement and moved to Garage --->
(several different go-arounds with crappy manual presses, followed by beater javelin)
Tension meter
'paint' Thickness Gauge
Starlight Exposure Unit  -- better screens and faster exposure times (why invest in a MH.. they were roughly the same cost)
Red-Chili D -- temperature controlled flashing
Quartz Conveyor -- old Mercury conveyor wasn't holding temps very well.
new 1000g x .01g scale for measuring PC system inks, etc.

----> Outgrew garage shop and moved to commercial --->
New press.
New Sprint Dryer
I-Image DTS (faster, better screens, worked with Tri-Loc, and great price in package deal)
Newman Frames and Stretching Table ("tighter screens print better")
Densitometer
Colorimeter

A lot of this is self explanatory... but the why on some of the more interesting parts:

Thickness meter -- understand our EOM and coating techniques with far more accuracy.  Now we use it anytime we're testing new emulsions, checking each others work, etc.

Tension meter -- purchased around the same time as the thickness meter to understand why some screens printed better than others.

Atkins probe -- purchased because everybody said you needed one to check for good cure (still a bit fuzzy on making it work repeatedly).

Densitometer -- wanted to understand and get better calibrated output from our DTS, and have onscreen %'s match printed shirt %s, we've actually used this more than I thought we would, and have learned very interesting things (who would have thought that you could easilly end up with 50% or more dot gain)

colorimeter -- we needed a 'better' way to match colors especially Stahls vinyl that seems to change color every year.

Offline mimosatexas

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Re: Next Question. What
« Reply #2 on: June 24, 2015, 10:19:02 AM »
I'll play as well.  Have been using photoshop since before I can remember and "seps" came naturally for the most part, though I still think I suck at the simproc type stuff.

First setup (apartment bedroom and bathroom)
-Free one color blue magnet press (I think these were originally from Ryonet, though I got mine from a buddy)
-Wood frames with who knows what mesh
-speedball emulsion and inks
-Work light attached above the toilet in my bathroom
-piece of glass from a poster frame to hold my kinkos copier films down
-cured with a hair dryer and hand iron
-washout in the shower

Second Setup (moved in with 2 friends and got a 4 bedroom house so the master bed and bath could be dedicated to screen printing and used as an office)
-DIY 4 color one station press made with hinge clamps, industrial lazy susan, and wood.  Worked pretty well actually.
-heat gun to flash dry
-cured on an old 9x12 geoknight hobbiest heat press i got at a garage sale for $5
-DIY 12 bulb exposure unit with unfiltered black light bulbs
-foam compression lid with weights as hold down
-washout in the shower, but added a hose attachment to the shower nozzle
-picked up some HP printer off craigslist free section for films, which sucked but was usable

Third Setup (finally moved to a place with a 2 car garage and fleshed out the setup)
-bought a 6 color 2 station silver press with micros
-picked up a pair of coil flash dryers on craigslist for $50 bucks each, dedicated one to flashing on press and one as a curing station with a little rotating table thing
-built a washout sink out of a shower stall that was on clearance (still use it today as my "dirty" sink)
-started using a pressure washer for exposure and reclaim (AMAZING!)
-finally got a gram scale and started trying to mix colors and do some discharge and waterbased printing as well
-still using flo tube expo, but made it larger so I could do up to 25x36 screens
-bought an epson 1400 for films
-DIY Vacuum platen for poster and transfer printing
-got about 2/3s of the way toward building my own conveyor dryer on the cheap before scrapping the idea due to safety concerns

Fourth setup (moved into an industrial space) - I'll kind of go chronologically here as changes have happened more frequently and I have upgraded and expanded a lot
-same equipment as setup 3 at the beginning, only moved from 400 sqft to about 560 sqft
-added a diy screen rack
-built a huge humidity controlled drying cabinet for screens that also acted as coating station and misc surface area
-got a smoking deal on a 10" x 36" National conveyor dryer
-got another smoking deal on a 16x20 geo knight heat press
-built my own 18x24 infrared flash dryer using a custom built intek panel, sold the coil dryers
-bought a dip tank (AMAZING!)
-Built a much larger vacuum table for doing larger posters and transfer sheets out of an old drafting table
-picked up an ancient Cameo 24 flatstock press for $100 bucks which never really worked right for transfer printing and had wonky print dimensions (sold it about 3 months later for a huge profit to a letterpress guy that is still using it for one color white prints on invitations and the like)
-EXPANSION! tore down a wall and expanded from 560 sqft to 900 sqft or so.  (This is also where I went from fulltime job with printing on the side to full time printing)
-bought an old Nation hat press and Geoknight label press
-built a post exposure dunk tank out of shower liner boards and treated plywood.
-built my first true exposure unit with a 1k MH from Homer (Thanks again!) and a a smoking deal on a Gast air pump from craigslist for the vacuum lid ($400 bucks all in after testing out a few different blanket materials)
-Bought my Kruzer and sold the silver press
-EXPANSION#2 tore down another wall, then rebuilt it with a door where I wanted, then built a screen room within that new room, went from 900ish sqft to 1250ish sqft
-built 2 more screen racks
-built my screen drying rack based on something I saw here
-built a much larger washout sink out of a free fiberglass tub and shower liner, now my "clean" sink and big enough for printing flags
-picked up an enormous vacuum frame from a sign company for $200 bucks so I can properly expose the flag frames
-picked up a DIY triloc style platen from Alan
-built my own FPU to match
-Added some slat wall to show off designs and make the space a little more customer friendly in the front
-bought a WF1100 for inkjet transfers
-bought a vinyl cutter for cut vinyl etc
-sold the National Hat press and picked up an old Geoknight instead (so much better)

COMING SOON:
-about to get a 6k exposure light
-about to upgrade to a much larger vinyl cutter (everyone said I would want bigger and better right away and they were right! I spent basically nothing on the first one though just to test the waters)
-looking into a few other things like a printer capable of at least 17" wide, hopefully even wider

EDIT:
All of this has happened over about 8 or so years, maybe longer now, but between setup 2 and 3 there was about a 4 year time where I was rarely printing and the setup just kind of sat idle in whatever place I was living.  All of the 3rd and 4th setup has been in the last 3 years or so.  The first expansion where I also quit my job to try this out full time was about a year and a half ago.  I really wish sometimes that I had kept working a little longer to save up more for an auto, but I was seriously burning out on how much printing I was doing and having the full time job which included lots of travel.  Also was about to have my first kid and needed to gain a lot of freedom of schedule.  It has worked out for the most part, though far from ideal in many ways (who knew how expensive kids were, right? :D).  I think having an auto would solve lots of issues, but it just isn't in the cards any time soon.  I'm starting to outsource more stuff and focus on smaller jobs in house in an effort to free up time to expand client base etc.  We'll see how it goes!
« Last Edit: June 24, 2015, 10:30:02 AM by mimosatexas »

Offline tpitman

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Re: Next Question. What
« Reply #3 on: June 24, 2015, 11:00:52 AM »
- Used 6-color Hopkins/no micros I found when looking at a big dryer to feed from a wood press I never got around to build. Press cost me $700. Came with a couple of wood screens and a spot gun (which actually held up for about 12 years). 16" Flash Dryer on a stand made out of an old office chair I got from some girl in Oregon. Cost me $75. Bought 6 Diamond Chase roller frames to replace 4 wood frames that warped right out of the gate. 500w halogen light exposure unit.

- Went big-time with a CAPS conveyor dryer. Paid $1400 for it at the ISS show. I still use it. Ordered a CAPS 6-color/4-pallet press on sale (supposed to be a show model) for $1650. Was actually brand new. Figured now I had micros. Micros were sh!tty, but otherwise the press was decent. Bought more and more roller frames - got over 40 now. Made a 6-tube unfiltered UV exposure unit with a rubber blanket and vacuum. Worked pretty good, and I still have it. Bought a used heat press from a hick down in Bartow for $400. Not the prettiest, but it's big and it still works. Bought a 24" Graphtek cutter for $1400 to do a job I do every year, and started doing signage as well.

- Sick of the sh!tty micros on the CAPS press, I had just about figured out a way to compensate for the thread lash in the turnbuckles after going to the ISS show and looking at Vastex presses, deciding that a Vastex would be my next press. Said "f__k it" and borrowed the money to buy a new press. Stumbled on one locally that had been bought at that same show 4 months earlier, but was $3000 instead of the $4500 they sold for new. Not a mark on it. Not many shirts printed, I guess. Bought a new Vastex 18x24 flash with the heavy duty stand.

- Bought a Newman stretching table for manual frames, and upgraded my press to 8-colors for $1500.

- Moved out of the garage into a warehouse. Plenty of room. Bought an AmerGraph 150 MH exposure unit and had it delivered. Made a decent washout sink from a double-basin utility sink from Home Depot with the partition cut out. Bought a used hat heat press.

- After two years moved the crap back to my garage. Turns out a storefront did me no good with the customers I have, and the rent/electicity/insurance was not cheap. I miss the space, but I like the money in my pocket.

- Looking ahead about a year, a really good deal for someone who has started but is looking to upgrade to a decent manual shop when I sell the whole mess.
« Last Edit: June 25, 2015, 03:31:10 AM by tpitman »
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Offline ABuffington

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Re: Next Question. What
« Reply #4 on: June 24, 2015, 12:50:24 PM »
3 color wooden table flip top
air dry inks in back yard
sun exposure
1 cat
moved to 1500 warehouse

2 hopkins presses,
an oven
wooden frames
plastisol inks
1 cat

Moved to 20k warehouse
Advance Multiprinter (yes I am that old)
MHM SA
3 1 color Filbars (killer 1 color semi auto)
no cats

Moved to 50k warehouse
4 MHM's 2000
1 multiprinter
1 Olympian
3 Filbars
1 beagle

Sold it all (except beagle) so I could merchandise clothing line and outsourced everything
to printers who used to be my competition.  Surfed everyday.
1 Gibson Guitar
2 amps
Play music instead of working my butt off til Midnight.


20 years later
Gibson 72 Les Paul
Strats
New amps, acoustics
Sell great emulsion and mesh.
Play til Midnight most of the time
Outsource old clients work to a friend.
1 cat, slightly used.

No regrets.
Alan Buffington
Murakami Screen USA  - Technical Support and Sales
www.murakamiscreen.com

Offline tonypep

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Re: Next Question. What
« Reply #5 on: June 25, 2015, 07:25:27 AM »
That was awesome Alan