Water-based/discharge printers

[Shanarchy]

People who are running water-based and discharge, what dryer are you using? Are you happy with it's performance? And are you on an auto or manual?

[RICK STEFANICK]

m/r sprint s/s with 20 ft. of heat- Handles 2 autos easily in this shop
Interchange Air Jet with 12 ft. of heat- Handles 2 autos easily in this shop
m/r mini sprint- Handles 2 manuals in this shop but would easily handle 1 auto
They all work excellent with discharge

[ericheartsu]

we are getting ready to upgrade our main dryer but we use:
M&R Sprint with 8 feet of heat
M&R mini sprint with 8 feet of heat

Both work well, but the belt crawls along to make sure we get correct retention time!

[Shanarchy]

Both work well, but the belt crawls along to make sure we get correct retention time!

This is my biggest concern, I want to make sure if we start offering it that we can realistically run production. We're a small shop so we don't need to be able to crank out 800 pieces an hour with it, but need to be able to put out a semi-realistic number.

[ericheartsu]

Both work well, but the belt crawls along to make sure we get correct retention time!

This is my biggest concern, I want to make sure if we start offering it that we can realistically run production. We're a small shop so we don't need to be able to crank out 800 pieces an hour with it, but need to be able to put out a semi-realistic number.

If it's a full sized print, we can average around 350/hr on our dryers.

Full size being like 17" tall.

[ZooCity]

Sprint 2000 HO.  60" belt, 16' of heat. 

I feel 16' is a minimum if you have 2 autos on the dryer that might be running wb/dc/hsa.   At that chamber length you get about 1.5 min retention and can still keep up with both machines for most print sizes.  You can lower retention but need to up the heat and airflow or potentially use fixatives, etc. which all equals additional hassle and an inferior cure in my opinion.    I would honestly prefer 20-24' of heat and/or increased air exchange for our 2 auto setup.

[Shanarchy]

Are there any good electric options? I don't think gas is an option where I am at.

[cbjamel]

Propane?

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[Underbase37]

Gas is what you want for WB and still be production friendly.

Murphy

[ZooCity]

You can do forced air right with electric, it really doesn't matter from a physics perspective how you heat the air that your are blowing around and exchanging.  It's just hard on the wallet.   

You've probably heard it before and I can confirm it's true that the payment on a loan for a gas dryer + gas bill is cheaper than running electric, at least in our neck of the woods.  It might still be worth it to install the gas service, buy the gas dryer- the total costs could still be lower than electric.  Out here, getting an upgraded electrical service costs us a fortune but they'll size up the gas service on their dime and gas is also cheap. 

[Shanarchy]

Propane?

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When going to propane, Is it like a propane tank that goes on the back of a fork lift that can be kept in doors? Or is it a large tank that needs to be kept outside?

[cbjamel]

Large tank outside. 250-500 gal or more usually if allowed.

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[Shanarchy]

Large tank outside. 250-500 gal or more usually if allowed.

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That's what I figured. We are on the top floor of an old mill building. Not sure that would be an option here.

[Maff]

I feel 16' is a minimum if you have 2 autos on the dryer that might be running wb/dc/hsa.   At that chamber length you get about 1.5 min retention and can still keep up with both machines for most print sizes.

Hey Zoo how are you curing for only 1.5 min? Higher temps?

We are a manual shop and print a fair amount of Wb/DC. We have a forced air electric ir dryer. 3 panels (about 4' of heat) and 36" belt. We cure at at 320 for 2.5-3 min and in order to get that we have to slow  our dryer down to the slowest possible crawl it can go and then figure out how small we can fold each shirt to fit as many on the belt as possible.... It's painful

[TCT]

Aren't you on the East coast? They don't run gas everywhere? As long as the building owner is cool with it and they would place it, you could put the tank behind the building/wherever and pipe it up to your spot...

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