1st time Plasti-charge help

[recovery_shirts]

Hi everyone. Gonna be ordering my 1st round of Plasticharge materials and was wondering if I could get some help/direction. I've done water-based discharge before w/good results, but am now eager to try things w/my current Plastisols. Here are my questions/list of products I'm thinking of getting:

1- CCI- Getting P-charge & D-Powder. My concern is w/white plastisol. Most people seem to recommend D-White, but isn't this a water-based ink that will require forced air or a gas powered dryer to cure (I've got a small dryer)? Is there a 50% plastisol 50% base Plastisol white on the market that works well?

2- Red ink. I heard that certain reds don't discharge well and/or don't retain their color. If so, is there a brand on red that does hold up well when mixed?

3- Emulsion- any info on which emulsion really holds up, and is affordable? I'm looking at CCI's TX-D, but it's a lot more expensive that what I'm spending now. Plus I've never had good results w/pink emulsions, not sure why..

4- Garments- has anyone compiled a list of "not good for discharging" brands/styles? if not, can you name a few that haven't discharged well? I figure this is easier than saying which have worked well..

5- Best/cheapest place to buy CCI products?

That's pretty much it for now. If you can answer any of the above, I'd really appreciate it. Happy printing..

p.s.- has anyone tried mixing regular water-based discharge (w/activator) w/plastisol, instead of using Plasticharge?

Thanks y'all!

[tonypep]

On that last note don't even try. It will not work. Don't know why you woould want to. Curious why you want to use plasticharge since you have done straight discharge. The latter is far superior on several levels

[recovery_shirts]

Why would anyone want to do Plasticharge? I don't know, because I already have a ton of plastisol colors? No flash? No underbase? I've only done discharge w/the ink and activator, so the end result is that tan color. The dyes didn't do the trick for me..

Why try it? I don't know, why not. Seems like "Plasticharge" is a combination of something similar, plastisol and an activator. Just thought someone may have given it a shot..

Obviously not you though.

[ebscreen]

Let me guess, you're a gun advocate?

Sorry, inside joke.


Plasticharge is nowhere near as bright, reliable, or easy to use (yep) as straight discharge.
We used it a few times and then saw the light of actual discharge. Plasticharge tends to be dull,
impossible to even get in the ballpark with colors, and the hand is a lot heavier than WB. Just mixing
a magic chemical with your off the shelf plastisol seems like a great idea, but it really isn't worth it in the end.

I would figure out why you can't achieve colors with the WB and go from there.

[Frog]

I'll weigh in on why someone would try one of the hybrids.
I have used the Wilflex Oasis version because I don't have the dryer for true discharge. It is quite forgiving, and needs little more than a standard plastisol-capable  dryer. I also could not exhaust standard discharge into my residential environment.

But, I would never try to color match most colors with it either as it leans towards pastels.

And recovery, brash as he may sound, Tony has been around the block at least twice with all of these inks, and does speak with some authority and first hand knowledge.

[recovery_shirts]

eb- mostly because i don't have a gas powered dryer.. i've got a tiny electric one. thus plasticharge sounds appealing, even if i have to run them through a couple times.

frog- thanks for the advice on color matching, had no idea. guess it's something i'll figure out as i go. and as for tony.. i don't care. that's still no reason to be an ass to someone who's asking for help.. it does show a lot about his character though..

[ebscreen]

See that number under your name? That's the number of posts you have made.

See the number under Tony's? Yeah.....

It ain't gonna go over well fella. I'm not Tony but I'd wager he meant no harm, and you're taking
what he said the wrong way. Remember, you can't type inflection or sarcasm.

[recovery_shirts]

Really I could care less, especially about how many posts someone has. Some people are nice, some aren't. I came here for advice on how to do this, not for someone to ask "why would you even try that"? how am i supposed to answer that? cuz I'm an idiot?

whatever happened to if u don't have something nice to say, don't say it at all? unless ur trying to keep ur post count nice and high i guess..

interesting forum u got going here..

[ebscreen]

Well, you come on here saying that you have achieved good results with waterbased discharge, then
state that you want to switch to plasticharge, an obvious (for anyone with experience with both) downgrade.
The "why would you want to do that" is completely understandable in that context. You have already used
the superior product and achieved good results, why would you want to switch to an inferior product?
Apparently you did not achieve the results you desired, but it's not our fault for not knowing that from your first post.

I have never seen a plasticharge white that was anywhere near good.

silkscreeningsupplies.com carries everything you are looking for relabelled under their own name. Personally
I think they are more suited for the hobbiest than the production shop, but that's me.
If you watch the video on the plasticharge product and look at the color achieved, blech.

[recovery_shirts]

"obvious (for anyone with experience with both)" which i don't have, thus all my questions, and this thread. how am i supposed to know it's a downgrade if i've never done it? google plasticharge and you get people talking about how "great" the product is, some on this forum. all the videos say it's good. so i came here, to ask about it.

thx for info on plasti-charge white.

yeah i agree ryonet products aren't the best.

[Gilligan]

I'm gonna give it one shot and then I'm done.

When I read Tony's post, I did not read it at all like he was being a dick.  Just straight facts.  It won't work and why not just run discharge because it's better.  Tony is the KING of discharge and when he talks I listen, take notes and maybe even print out the post!

I think he was honestly trying to save you some time and trouble.

Relax a bit, no one is trying to piss you off or one up you.  Hope that helps man... good luck!

[recovery_shirts]

Ok ok, so maybe I'm being overly sensitive.. my bad.

I guessed I hoped people would answer 1-5 instead questioning me for the p.s. part..

deep breaths..

[Gilligan]

Awesome attitude!  Good on ya!  Now hopefully someone can chime in with some of the answers you are looking for.  I'm not experienced in even paying attention to a plasticharge discussion.  I want to go straight DC when I get the chance.

I am interested in a few of your questions as well... so I'm all ears!

[ebscreen]

Just about everything you are asking about are the downfalls of plasticharge.


Never seen a decent plasticharge white.

Heard of but have not seen a decent plasticharge red. Our WB reds kick effing a.

In fact the only decent colors we ever achieved with plasticharge were like dark blues and greys.


We like Aquasol HV as it's a pure photopolymer. It's 50 something a gallon or so. I don't pay attention
because emulsion is not a place to skimp. Nor is ink. The overall costs are pennies or less per piece
produced, so try and keep that in mind instead of aiming for the cheapest product available. I know it's
tough when starting out but spending dollars (wasted shirts, unsatisfactory product) to save dimes
never makes sense.


Hard to stay on top of what discharges and doesn't, you can even get some pieces in the same run that
won't. Gildan has a chart out that is more on the safe side. (IE many C ratings discharge fine, etc)
Royal, purple, kelly, and some reds just don't work.

Buy from CCI direct.

[blue moon]

see below:

Hi everyone. Gonna be ordering my 1st round of Plasticharge materials and was wondering if I could get some help/direction. I've done water-based discharge before w/good results, but am now eager to try things w/my current Plastisols. Here are my questions/list of products I'm thinking of getting:

1- CCI- Getting P-charge & D-Powder. My concern is w/white plastisol. Most people seem to recommend D-White, but isn't this a water-based ink that will require forced air or a gas powered dryer to cure (I've got a small dryer)? Is there a 50% plastisol 50% base Plastisol white on the market that works well?

we used regular discharge with a non forced air dryer pretty successfully. This was straight discharge rather than plasticharge though. had problems with underbasing, but 100% discharge was no problem (well, slow, but very good results). 

2- Red ink. I heard that certain reds don't discharge well and/or don't retain their color. If so, is there a brand on red that does hold up well when mixed?
I've seen a print done with Union Ink's product that was spectacular. Give them a call and find out about the plasticharge inks used to print the Godzilla shirt (last year's contest winner). If you really want to go plasticharge route, that was very impressive.

3- Emulsion- any info on which emulsion really holds up, and is affordable? I'm looking at CCI's TX-D, but it's a lot more expensive that what I'm spending now. Plus I've never had good results w/pink emulsions, not sure why..
Any diazo or dual cure should hold up to the waterbased printing better than non mixing type (SBQ/photopolymer). It just happens to be that dual cure emulsions (and especially straight diazo) are cheaper than SBQ/PP.

4- Garments- has anyone compiled a list of "not good for discharging" brands/styles? if not, can you name a few that haven't discharged well? I figure this is easier than saying which have worked well..
Actually, start with Gildans, they discharge well. They are a safe bet and you can work your way to the other brands. See here for the color chart of what dischrges well: https://impweb.imprintswholesale.com/pdf/gildan/GN%20445%20Discharge%20Rate%20Chart-3.pdf


5- Best/cheapest place to buy CCI products?
Don't know who the cheapest is, but we get some of our discharge stuff from Nazdar. You should be able to get most everything you need there. The company president actually posts here and will get you in touch with your local rep that can help you out or in many cases will point you in the right direction.

That's pretty much it for now. If you can answer any of the above, I'd really appreciate it. Happy printing..

p.s.- has anyone tried mixing regular water-based discharge (w/activator) w/plastisol, instead of using Plasticharge?

have not after I was told not to!
 

Thanks y'all!

And BTW, most of Tony's post are to answer questions and help members out. That is a lot of help from a very unselfish guy. He is definitely not the type of guy to get in a pissing contest over this stuff, there is no need for him to prove anything. He is the one that tests the products for the manufacturers and even has his own proprietary formulas for the inks he developed if they are not commercially available. He is one of the top US experts when it comes to discharge printing.

pierre