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Heat Seal - Heat Press - Whatever you want to call it! => General Heat Seal => Topic started by: balloonguy on November 27, 2018, 10:26:51 AM
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Good morning,
My wife has a cameo for vinyl shirts like disney vacations and stuff like that. It works but it is slow and inconsistent. I feel like we need a machine that is geared to a business, not an at home hobby. Will you please share what you have? What you like? What you don't like? What you would have done differently?
Anyone using a printer/plotter for printable heat transfer vinyl? Do you feel like that cost can recouped on these orders of 1 - 7 shirts?
Thanks,
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In the beginning, I had the folks at Wellington House (at the time, the exclusive West Coast Stahls dealer) cut the occasional needed vinyl job for me.
Then, for many years, I took advantage of a local friend and colleague's willingness to cut vinyl for me, (at the cost of a replacement blade or cutting strip every now and then) and enjoyed the feeling of not having to invest in a machine myself.
That said, I finally bit the bullet, and picked up a Graphtec CE6000-40, and have never looked back! Being able to produce my own, on demand, on my schedule, and not having to drive to pick up was a wonderful feeling.
Viscerally, for me, it paid for itself within a few days! As for financially recouping your cost on jobs of 1-7 shirts, that would obviously depend on just how many of these jobs you did, and how you price them.
How long to recoup $1200? (or a little more if you find that you need bigger than 15")
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I would go 24" at a minimum. Some of the vinyl we get is 17-18"
I don't know if I would look at it as a huge profit center. It is great for the jobs that have one shirt that is too small to print and needs vinyl, or you need some names for the back of shirts and ordering them from Stahls will take too long.
It can be a life saver
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Go for a 24" at the smallest, and if longevity is important, our Roland Camm-1 PNC1100 is 24 years old, and still cutting just fine.
Steve
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Go with the graphtec over the Roland in my opinion. Both machines are awesome, but the Roland software is horrible. Graphtec you can cut right out of illustrator with a plugin.
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I like being able to cut from ai. Can I just google the pluggin or do I get it from graphtech?
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The program I use with CorelDRAW, Cutting Master, was downloaded from the Graphtec site.
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I’ve been using a Graphtec with Coreldraw for years. No complaints.
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Go with the graphtec over the Roland in my opinion. Both machines are awesome, but the Roland software is horrible. Graphtec you can cut right out of illustrator with a plugin.
I'll keep that in mind when we eventually upgrade. We don't use the Roland software, but a version of Flexi-sign from waaaaaayyyyyy back, running on a Mac Clone from Power Computing on Mac OS9... and we have a second or third generation iMac (the round one) that acts as a go between to the network. We've tried every adapter made to get the plotter to work with a more current OS, but, if it ain't broke...
Steve
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A 1,500.00 to 3,000.00 cutter will easily pay for itself in a few months....While 24" is nice a 15" machine can do most of the clothing jobs that come your way...24" is pretty much a minimum if you want to do signs and banners....
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more media options if you go bigger. 24" is the smallest I would go.
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This one cuts almost 20"... http://www.graphtec.co.jp/en/imaging/celite/index.html (http://www.graphtec.co.jp/en/imaging/celite/index.html)
Do you guys with experience think this one is pretty decent?
Thanks.
Matt
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This one cuts almost 20"... [url]http://www.graphtec.co.jp/en/imaging/celite/index.html[/url] ([url]http://www.graphtec.co.jp/en/imaging/celite/index.html[/url])
Do you guys with experience think this one is pretty decent?
Thanks.
Matt
there is this one also. CE6000-60 PLUS
i have roland but could be better on some things. small letters esp.
shane
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G890A using Tapatalk
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I have the 6000, if you look at Stahls catalogue most of the film they sell is 20" so make sure whatever you get can cut at least 20".
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I have the 6000, if you look at Stahls catalogue most of the film they sell is 20" so make sure whatever you get can cut at least 20".
Perhaps, but most of the film I get from Siser and Thermoflex is available in 15". Looking at my stash right now, I have 24 15" rolls and 3 Stahls 20"
My decision on getting the 15 was based on the fact that I chose years ago to get out of flat stock. So, besides the occasional car window sticker, all of my shirts do fine with designs limited to one dimension being 13.25"(the for sure safe actual cutting maximum due to the roller clearance)
When I do use a film available only on 20", I either bite the bullet and waste 5", or cut it into more efficient sizes.
That said, of course, in general, because often one doesn't know what they'll want in the future, the bigger the better, and the additional $600 could be well spent.
As for the "Lite" version Balloon linked to, I'd say if you are only jumping slightly up from your wife's Cameo in production numbers, it would be fine, but it is not the heavy duty workhorse the CE6000, in either size, is. For that matter, Royster claims great luck with some cheaper machines from folks like US Cutter. (btw, do you notice how at places like Harbor Freight, they often love to use American geographical-referenced brand names for their Chinese and Indian stuff?)
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I got myself a Graphtec CE5000-24 about 6 years ago. That got me in the signage vinyl too.
Paid itself in a month because I did signage so 20 trailers. After a year I upgraded to Graphtec FC8600-54" and not looking back.
Now, sales of my business are about 50/50 between apparel and signage.
But yes on Graphtec and yes on a minimum of 24".
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I have the same one as Frog since I wanted something that didn't take up too much space and could handle small decals and HTV here and there. Ended up getting a couple of jobs to die cut gold foil laser printed labels for the "medical" field and paid the thing off in a day. The ability to read registration marks is really cool and opens up a lot of possibilities.
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The ability to read registration marks is really cool and opens up a lot of possibilities.
I may pick your brain on that at some point, (either PM or a new thread) because, though I rarely mess with opaque transfers, it did intrigue me. However, when I first explored trying it out, I got nowhere.
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I have a 30" Roland Camm1 that I bought used when my 20 yr old son was in a car seat, it still cuts like a champ. I cut straight from Illy, just set the line width to .01.
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The ability to read registration marks is really cool and opens up a lot of possibilities.
I may pick your brain on that at some point, (either PM or a new thread) because, though I rarely mess with opaque transfers, it did intrigue me. However, when I first explored trying it out, I got nowhere.
Don't worry about derailing the thread. This is something I would be very interested in learning too.
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The ability to read registration marks is really cool and opens up a lot of possibilities.
I may pick your brain on that at some point, (either PM or a new thread) because, though I rarely mess with opaque transfers, it did intrigue me. However, when I first explored trying it out, I got nowhere.
Don't worry about derailing the thread. This is something I would be very interested in learning too.
So basically you create two layers, one with the artwork and one with a cut line. The Cutting Master software allows you to place 2 to 4 registration marks around the image so when you print it (only artwork layer) on say inkjet transfer paper it prints the marks for the optical eye on the Graphtec cutting head to read the cut line layer. When you load the paper you position the blade near the vertex of the first registration mark, tell the software to start cutting the cut line only and it'll read all of the marks then reposition it at the start and begin cutting.
Here's an album of how I print stickers and use the plotter to actually die cut all the way through:
https://imgur.com/a/6b31y
There are a lot of people that say you can't die cut on the CE series plotters without a carrier sheet but you totally can as long as you lay out the cuts offset from each other and really really dial in your settings but that's a whole other thread.
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That is an awesome post. What kind of beer is that in 20th or so picture? NA I presume. ;)
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Thanks! I think it's a Dogfish Head 60 minute, usually I'll get Natty Boh but I must've been feeling like a big spender. (This was before I quit my full time job and had a steady income ;))
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too funny! I brew my own now so I can have those big beers at a much lower cost. Plus it is fun to make!
What kind of ink/paper are you using for the screen printed decals? I may want to try this?
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I've always wanted to get in to that but haven't had the time yet.
I use rolls of Greenstar vinyl from USCutter that I chop down to fit on the vacuum table and Nazdar 4700 ink. It's water based so no fumes but if it's going on a high traffic area (water bottles/laptops) it needs to be clear coated. I've got non clear coated ones sticking up outside around town that are 3+ years old and they still look great.
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It's water based so no fumes but if it's going on a high traffic area (water bottles/laptops) it needs to be clear coated. I've got non clear coated ones sticking up outside around town that are 3+ years old and they still look great.
I realized how bad the GV series from Nazdar was when I started *liking* the fumes.
What are you using to clearcoat?
FWIW General Formulations makes sheet vinyl, beats cutting rolls down and trying to register with your sheets curling up.
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I'm using the same (Nazdar 4700) to clear coat, seems to work just fine. Just requested an account with GF, thanks for the suggestion! When I was looking for sheets they ended up being 3x what cutting down the sheets cost and I'd still have to cut them down since my vacuum table is small.
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Just wanted to give a quick update to this.
We bought the cte lite against my better judgement. We have had nothing but trouble. The tech support at graphtec told me "it's broken" and hung up. I got about no communication from them after that. I did send an email to the corporate office with my complaint and got an apology but no help. Rob at Tubelite (where we bought) was great but just not familiar with the unit. After several weeks of load issues, not seeing media and having to find a work around for anything and everything I try to cut I decided to return the plotter. 2 weeks after that I got a call from tubelite that they will send a new one. Great. Yesterday, (2 weeks after the proposed solution) I get a return label from graphtec. I emailed back that I would this out today but more importantly when is the replacement coming? It is their policy to get the old unit back before sending the replacement. It seems like paying for equipment in November and still not being able to use it in February is nuts. I doubt I will ever get in to large format graphics but if I do I can guaranty it will not be with these guys.