I can’t show it, but we warped a print last week and have to set up the job again today to print one piece for a good customer that has to have this small order perfect. We put too much adhesive on the platen and warped the print when we yanked it off the press. Those of you out there that have never had that happen?
Liars!!!!
It happens to all of us, but we struggle mightily to avoid it.
Some tips:
– If you put too much roll on adhesive or too much spray tack on. Put a shirt or two on and pull them off before you try an important print for real.
– Don’t use the cheapest crap you can find. That is penny wise and f’n pound foolish. I would say that at least 25% of the shops I go into are using sub-standard adhesives. If you use bad glue, you are going to have registration problems, ink won’t release properly from the screens, and you will have to spray or roll on more adhesive which is both wasteful and makes a mess.
– Don’t be tempted to print a few more pieces when you know you need to re-apply adhesive. That shirt that comes loose will make a big mess. It isn’t worth it.
What would you recommend to use when printing with waterbased ink? We have tried both web and mist spray and both lose tack very fast causing problems for the shirt releasing from the pallet.
We used a water-based roll-on adhesive which has to be full dried before starting to print. We often have to use a mist in addition if we are losing adhesion because of big areas of water-based printing. Your comment has got me researching what other people do for this since I would say we don’t have a great answer for you.