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Heat Seal - Heat Press - Whatever you want to call it! => General Heat Seal => Topic started by: inkman996 on December 12, 2023, 11:45:18 AM
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I am DONE! with Hotronix. There has to be a better solution out there. What are people using?
Currently we have two Fusion IQ, and one Fusion IQ Air
e also have two 360 IQ hat presses.
The fit and finish on these machines is complete garbage, the material used is garbage, mostly soft pot metal. Both our Fusion IQ's are falling apart and both are only two years old. The Air IQ is 3 years old and gives us fits constantly.
One of the 360 Hat presses is defective, does not have enough magnetic strength to keep it closed, I have contacted support and the only reply I got was a sales pitch.
For the amount of money these things cost we expect better quality and QC.
We have moved heavily into pressing and wish to purchase more machines, just not Hotronix!
So whats the Cadillac of heat presses out there?
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Man, my hotronix recently failed due to a wiring thing and I can't figure it out and getting in there is very annoying. And I bought it off a business partner and they won't help me cause I am not the original owner!
Any way I borrowed a Hix press from another person I do work with. He found it in the garbage 25 years ago and it works like a champ. A little finicky with the heat and it needs a compressor but relly saved me the past week.
I am also in search of a reliable press if anyone has any suggestions.
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I like my two old (non-Cadilac) George Knight presses, and have gotten great personal tech support from them.
I also think that Insta puts out quality stuff.
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I like my two old (non-Cadilac) George Knight presses, and have gotten great personal tech support from them.
I also think that Insta puts out quality stuff.
I'll second George Knight. Had one for over 25 years, a simple clamshell. We picked up a DC16AP (Air) used off eBay last year, and after a couple of very minor fixes, it's been great. Their service is very good too, in my experience. As for Hotronix, I picked up one of their hat presses 20 years ago, and it's still running just the way it's supposed to. It does sound like their quality has gone down.
Steve
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Stahls or Instagrafix always my go to Hotronix/Hix not for daily industrial use IMO
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we have three George Knight heat presses - two are DK20SP swing away air, the other one is a simple hat press. the only thing i would change is the sensor that detects if it over the platen. ours seems to move every few weeks. we have various platens that werent terribly expensive.
sometimes we press 2000 shirts a week, sometimes its 100... depends on the workload.
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I like most of the new shuttles, auto swingaway/foot pedal/air op from stahls. Even some rotaryi$$$$. Would never buy a manual for anykind of daily use or consistent volume.
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Thanks for the suggestions, sounds like Geo Knight is something to look into.
We want a combination of manual and automatic going, manual for the lower qty stuff and odd ball stuff.
The Air IQ on with the stand is a great machine except that changing platens on it sucks and it has hiccups in its brain constantly.
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I'll throw in another endorsement for Geo Knight. One of the best made heat presses I've used.
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we have a slew of presses, the only one I want to use as a boat anchor is the 360 IQ hat press. Biggest POS on the market. Don't buy into the heated bottom platen, no crease on your hats nonsense.
Anyone want to buy a 360 IQ hat press ? it works GREAT.... ;D
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I got a Knight air shuttle when we started DTF. Works fine. If I need a bigger print area I use the air swing away I've had for years.
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Geo Knight
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We have few older Hotronix and they work pretty well. Bought some used ones for parts and pick up the AC plug every few years.
The problem is most of us are commenting how great our 20 yer old presses are… most new presses are nowhere near as good. So the question is who has a really good brand new press?
Eric from nightowls is importing stuff that should be good, but might be big set ups only.
Eric you around to comment?
Pierre
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I like the MEM dual table heat presses. Much cheaper and work great.
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We're looking for a daul shuttle at the moment. Seems like MEM makes a solid press and a few other brands make similar looking MEM presses, painted a different color with different features. Anatol has a nice looking one too, but I want to get some real user opinions on it. George Knight and Insta also are on my radar.
Our old hotronix clam has worked really well for a long time, but we are manually pressing way to much latley, so time for an upgrade
Sent from my SM-G990U using Tapatalk
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My experience with all the dual shuttles is while they do not necessarily make you twice as fast, the will. . certainly speed things up greatly. It's equally important to have good operators who understand multi tasking
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zane or i are happy to chime in on this stuff if you want to dm or email us:
eric@Nightowlsprint.com
zane@nightowlsprint.com
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To minimize movement and because the presses are only 10sec/5sec, I just went with Hotronix air Fusion IQ 16x20. I believe our set up is faster than a shuttle would be with our process. If we pressed for 20+ secs, I would definitely consider the dual platens though.
I do dislike the reliability - chain is miniscule and loses tension, a board or two have gone bad over the years, one press we had issues with heating up and had to send it in to get fixed. They definitely need to be built stronger. No real issues with all the new ones we bought this year but it's the next couple of years I'm worried about...
I can't believe they haven't fixed the pins that go into the bottom platen to make it a more snug fit - the amount of play makes it so you can have crooked prints vs where the lasers are, if you don't make sure the handle secures the platens really well. Poor engineering designs in those areas.
We also anchored the base of our press to pallet racking so the lasers and the heat press don't come out of alignment.
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To minimize movement and because the presses are only 10sec/5sec, I just went with Hotronix air Fusion IQ 16x20. I believe our set up is faster than a shuttle would be with our process. If we pressed for 20+ secs, I would definitely consider the dual platens though.
I do dislike the reliability - chain is miniscule and loses tension, a board or two have gone bad over the years, one press we had issues with heating up and had to send it in to get fixed. They definitely need to be built stronger. No real issues with all the new ones we bought this year but it's the next couple of years I'm worried about...
I can't believe they haven't fixed the pins that go into the bottom platen to make it a more snug fit - the amount of play makes it so you can have crooked prints vs where the lasers are, if you don't make sure the handle secures the platens really well. Poor engineering designs in those areas.
We also anchored the base of our press to pallet racking so the lasers and the heat press don't come out of alignment.
Yea I do not get the platen changing system, it is so wobbly. If we dye Dye Sub we would never go near one of these units. Thing is their is scores of proven rigid platen changing systems already invented why try to re-invent something and in doing so make it junk?
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We're looking for a daul shuttle at the moment. Seems like MEM makes a solid press and a few other brands make similar looking MEM presses, painted a different color with different features. Anatol has a nice looking one too, but I want to get some real user opinions on it. George Knight and Insta also are on my radar.
Our old hotronix clam has worked really well for a long time, but we are manually pressing way to much latley, so time for an upgrade
Sent from my SM-G990U using Tapatalk
We have several MEM presses. If you buy them directly on Alibaba you get a very good deal.
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I will never buy a Hotronix press again. Hands down the biggest POS i've ever used. We were a few minutes from a fire a couple times with one. We finally sold it for scrap.
I bought a Hix used about 20 years ago and it still runs strong.
We have a Geo Knight Dual platen hat press. It's good. My only complaint is the programming is clunky for settings.
We just got a Chinese dual platen press from Lawson and so far it's been amazing.
So I'd recommend Hix or Geo Knight. The Lawson one is too new to really tell if it's durable, so far I love it though.
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We skipped Lawson and ordered a dual platen pneumatic heat press on Ali baba last year. It took 3 months for it to arrive, but it's been totally freaking awesome and it was stupid cheap to get it here. It had a really sketchy two print 220v plug, with no ground. I ended up drilling a hole in the case and wiring up a ground wire and replacing the cord, which was not anywhere near the correct gauge for 220v imo. Not too hard though. All of the pneumatic tubing used metric connectors. But we were able to find them on amazon easily. Only other weird thing, it has a whacky automatic mode which is turned-on by a toggle knob labeled in Chinese. It will heat press your hand if not careful. So liability issues, yah probably? But we all know about it and joke about it at the shop. Probably not the best thing if you have a lot of greenhorns running around your shop. IT gets the job done every day, just have to do the math on Celsius to F LOL!
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We skipped Lawson and ordered a dual platen pneumatic heat press on Ali baba last year. It took 3 months for it to arrive, but it's been totally freaking awesome and it was stupid cheap to get it here. It had a really sketchy two print 220v plug, with no ground. I ended up drilling a hole in the case and wiring up a ground wire and replacing the cord, which was not anywhere near the correct gauge for 220v imo. Not too hard though. All of the pneumatic tubing used metric connectors. But we were able to find them on amazon easily. Only other weird thing, it has a whacky automatic mode which is turned-on by a toggle knob labeled in Chinese. It will heat press your hand if not careful. So liability issues, yah probably? But we all know about it and joke about it at the shop. Probably not the best thing if you have a lot of greenhorns running around your shop. IT gets the job done every day, just have to do the math on Celsius to F LOL!
Gotta be careful with pressing your hand! Hospitalized for two weeks after a pressed arm.
https://www.osha.gov/ords/imis/accidentsearch.accident_detail?id=125361.015 (https://www.osha.gov/ords/imis/accidentsearch.accident_detail?id=125361.015)
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Which is why I strongly support the units with a dead man switch.
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Two handed operation (like a guillotine cutter) and an emergency stop button (accessible from where you may be caught) are a must.
I'd add an air pressure sensor and a thermal fuse for fire safety as well. China isn't exactly known for workplace safety.
We ended up building our own shuttle press. I can post the cad files and software if there is any interest.
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Two handed operation (like a guillotine cutter) and an emergency stop button (accessible from where you may be caught) are a must.
I'd add an air pressure sensor and a thermal fuse for fire safety as well. China isn't exactly known for workplace safety.
We ended up building our own shuttle press. I can post the cad files and software if there is any interest.
That is what I like about the Knight DC16AP that we have, I can be fairly clumsy, but there is no way for even me to press my hand. Now, if you press someone else's hand, there is an emergency switch in the middle of the head. Do not press someone else's hand...
Steve
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we have a slew of presses, the only one I want to use as a boat anchor is the 360 IQ hat press. Biggest POS on the market. Don't buy into the heated bottom platen, no crease on your hats nonsense.
Anyone want to buy a 360 IQ hat press ? it works GREAT.... ;D
Man am I glad I saw this. I was seriously considering getting one of these, almost specifically for the bottom heated platen. Basically I will be pressing a lot of screen printed patches, and the top heat can smash/distort plastisol prints a bit, so I was thinking the lower heat option would be ideal to heat the glue from below and not heat up the ink too much on top.
I was originally considering a Geo Knight hat press and getting the lower heated platen add on for it. Do you have any experience with GK lower heat cap presses? Do you think the lower heat stuff is just a gimmick in general or it just sucks on the IQ360?
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I like the MEM dual table heat presses. Much cheaper and work great.
Our MEM is doing well. It was a pain to get though. It’ll be easy for you.
My direct order was cancelled because Night Scabs here doesn’t like people saying stuff like this:
Just be careful not to buy a repainted version and pay twice the price.
There’s reasons they don’t talk about them out in the open. You might realize you can get the same thing direct for less than half the price.
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Which is why I strongly support the units with a dead man switch.
These MEM / East West units can get stuck down it’s extremely sketchy. We do not use the auto function because of this. Clamping your hand would suck but having it wedged/stuck together like ours has been would be brutal. Jaws of Life type thing.
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we have a slew of presses, the only one I want to use as a boat anchor is the 360 IQ hat press. Biggest POS on the market. Don't buy into the heated bottom platen, no crease on your hats nonsense.
Anyone want to buy a 360 IQ hat press ? it works GREAT.... ;D
Man am I glad I saw this. I was seriously considering getting one of these, almost specifically for the bottom heated platen. Basically I will be pressing a lot of screen printed patches, and the top heat can smash/distort plastisol prints a bit, so I was thinking the lower heat option would be ideal to heat the glue from below and not heat up the ink too much on top.
I was originally considering a Geo Knight hat press and getting the lower heated platen add on for it. Do you have any experience with GK lower heat cap presses? Do you think the lower heat stuff is just a gimmick in general or it just sucks on the IQ360?
I just got my heated lower unit in. I'll let you know what I think of it when the patch job I have comes in. The platen is smaller than I expected, but it'll work.
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we have a slew of presses, the only one I want to use as a boat anchor is the 360 IQ hat press. Biggest POS on the market. Don't buy into the heated bottom platen, no crease on your hats nonsense.
Anyone want to buy a 360 IQ hat press ? it works GREAT.... ;D
Man am I glad I saw this. I was seriously considering getting one of these, almost specifically for the bottom heated platen. Basically I will be pressing a lot of screen printed patches, and the top heat can smash/distort plastisol prints a bit, so I was thinking the lower heat option would be ideal to heat the glue from below and not heat up the ink too much on top.
I was originally considering a Geo Knight hat press and getting the lower heated platen add on for it. Do you have any experience with GK lower heat cap presses? Do you think the lower heat stuff is just a gimmick in general or it just sucks on the IQ360?
I just got my heated lower unit in. I'll let you know what I think of it when the patch job I have comes in. The platen is smaller than I expected, but it'll work.
did you get the Hotronix or the GeoKnight?
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I have the GeoKnight.
If you want the experience of a hottronix press, take about $3500, and place it smack in front of space heater until it lights on fire, and then hope it doesn't burn your whole shop down.
Same end result.
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I have the GeoKnight.
If you want the experience of a hottronix press, take about $3500, and place it smack in front of space heater until it lights on fire, and then hope it doesn't burn your whole shop down.
Same end result.
Gotcha. Someone local has a GK DK7T, the dual clamp hat press, for sale and its a damn good price. Hoping to check it out soon to make sure everything works as it seems to have been put to work pretty good. If it works then I will probably buy it and then buy the bottom heat kit to put on one of the bases.
What has me curious is how the heat evenly gets through the inside center taping of a hat, where the front two panels come together. Seems since that part of the material is thicker, less heat will get to the patches glue there, possibly not adhering very well there.
I need the bottom heat to work so I am not putting so much heat onto the ink of the screen printed patches we make in-house. Looking forward to what you find with it.
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Which is why I strongly support the units with a dead man switch.
These MEM / East West units can get stuck down it’s extremely sketchy. We do not use the auto function because of this. Clamping your hand would suck but having it wedged/stuck together like ours has been would be brutal. Jaws of Life type thing.
We run MEM presses for almost 3 years now. Never had any issues at all.
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Our POS IQ360 hat press temps are off by about 100 degrees or more. bottom platen doesn't get hot enough to melt the glue... we have the temps maxed out, thing is straight trash. I had better luck with a janky ebay press.
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Which is why I strongly support the units with a dead man switch.
These MEM / East West units can get stuck down it’s extremely sketchy. We do not use the auto function because of this. Clamping your hand would suck but having it wedged/stuck together like ours has been would be brutal. Jaws of Life type thing.
We run MEM presses for almost 3 years now. Never had any issues at all.
I could get one stuck down in two seconds.
It’s called Murphy’s Law. What can go wrong will go wrong.
Don’t dismiss a safety issue. It’s definitely something to watch for.
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I could get one stuck down in two seconds.
It’s called Murphy’s Law. What can go wrong will go wrong.
Don’t dismiss a safety issue. It’s definitely something to watch for.
In the name of safety, what is the failure mode? There's a good chance the mfgr doesn't know about it.
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I have the GeoKnight.
If you want the experience of a hottronix press, take about $3500, and place it smack in front of space heater until it lights on fire, and then hope it doesn't burn your whole shop down.
Same end result.
so I found an open box/almost new DK7 for $300 and scooped it up. next order of business is to order the bottom heat device from GK. i am still very curious as to your thoughts on the bottom heat pallet though.
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I'll let you know. The one thing I noticed is the platen does seem kinda small. I hope that's not a problem. I should be using it next week.
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I have the GeoKnight.
If you want the experience of a hottronix press, take about $3500, and place it smack in front of space heater until it lights on fire, and then hope it doesn't burn your whole shop down.
Same end result.
so I found an open box/almost new DK7 for $300 and scooped it up. next order of business is to order the bottom heat device from GK. i am still very curious as to your thoughts on the bottom heat pallet though.
If you want a bottom heat pallet, i have one from geo knight i can sell you.
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If you want a bottom heat pallet, i have one from geo knight i can sell you.
oh yeah? what condition is it in and how much? also, what do you think of it? i follow night owls on IG, enjoy your feed and would love to know your feedback on how well it works.
also, why are selling it? did you find a better solution?
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In the name of safety, what is the failure mode? There's a good chance the mfgr doesn't know about it.
The manufacturer knows. In fact, their bigtime North America rep is right here in this thread already!
If it comes down crooked like this it gets wedged down and takes a LOT of force to open back up.
My main concern is that if your hand is in there it’s gunna come down crooked and get wedged because of your hand, ON your hand.
No, the e-stop doesn’t release it.
Also if you release the e-stop and it’s on auto it’ll snap down without you expecting it.
(https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20240403/268812cb46e84843c148c8948cbe7590.jpg)
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If you want a bottom heat pallet, i have one from geo knight i can sell you.
oh yeah? what condition is it in and how much? also, what do you think of it? i follow night owls on IG, enjoy your feed and would love to know your feedback on how well it works.
also, why are selling it? did you find a better solution?
PM Sent.
and yes we did. we started building machines and our build with the bottom heat and a shuttle press was what helped kick off us building.
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I'll let you know. The one thing I noticed is the platen does seem kinda small. I hope that's not a problem. I should be using it next week.
looking forward to it. thanks!
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If you want a bottom heat pallet, i have one from geo knight i can sell you.
oh yeah? what condition is it in and how much? also, what do you think of it? i follow night owls on IG, enjoy your feed and would love to know your feedback on how well it works.
also, why are selling it? did you find a better solution?
PM Sent.
and yes we did. we started building machines and our build with the bottom heat and a shuttle press was what helped kick off us building.
reply sent!
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I am also interested in something non Stahls. We have a big geo knight shuttle press that is a beast. I've seen things at trade shows. PM me too.
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I'll let you know. The one thing I noticed is the platen does seem kinda small. I hope that's not a problem. I should be using it next week.
so looking at this bottom heat attachment for the GK hat presses, it states it is a 3" x 5" pallet. you mention it being small, is yours not that size?