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screen printing => General Screen Printing => Topic started by: sweetts on October 08, 2011, 07:00:30 PM
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I have been printing a little over a year now and have re-used some screens several times. I am finding that my screens are starting to pop holes in mid stroke. I am a small printer out of my house so I try to stretch everything. My question is, when is a good time to retire a screen? If the tension seems good I use it but as of late I have had 4 screens just POP a hole while on the press and I would really like to avoid that. So any suggestions or tips? Maybe get some roller frames?
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Pop a hole?
That usually requires a foreign or misplaced object.
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last week I was printing a two color job, I printed about 40 shirts no issues, I pulled the squeegee and there it was a hole, it looked almost like a small burn hole. Maybe I will post picture. The very next order on the last shirt a hole along the edge of the image no sharp edges no anything. The only thing new is my dip tank but I could not see that causing an issue I am not leaving them in too long 3-4 min.
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screens should last tens of thousands of prints. You should not have any breaking. There is obviously an issue. What are you using to wash them?
pierre
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Odd that screens are getting holes after so little use, unless you're banging them up against something with a sharp edge. One thing I recall reading was a warning against using shop rags from a rag service, as they may have been used previously in a machine shop or garage and could still harbor metal shavings that didn't wash out, with a potential for tearing mesh.
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His are reported to be self-destructing in use, "mid stroke" to use sweetts' words.
It almost has to be crap in the ink, or a jagged squeegee.
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Or possibly your scoop coater has a burr or nick in it.
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last week I was printing a two color job, I printed about 40 shirts no issues, I pulled the squeegee and there it was a hole, it looked almost like a small burn hole. Maybe I will post picture. The very next order on the last shirt a hole along the edge of the image no sharp edges no anything. The only thing new is my dip tank but I could not see that causing an issue I am not leaving them in too long 3-4 min.
If you're getting burn holes in the mesh, you must be creating too much friction by moving the squeegee too fast effectively creating little temporary flash fires hidden by the ink.
I got nothing.
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where's your flash unit when your printing multi color is this heat damage from a screen sitting over a flsh or is your off contact excessive. lets see some pics
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It seems more like he is weakening the mesh in spots with a chemical during cleaning and the friction while printing is busting through. What chemicals are you using?
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My experience in that situation has been tears, not small holes.
As has been mentioned, a pic or two would be nice here.
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What are you using to scrub the screen? I use those green scrubby pads but when they are new I'll scrub lightly, once its broken in and soften I'll scrub like normal. Took me a few busted screens to figure this out...
Also if you leave tape on the screen while blasting it with a powerwasher your tape can flap around fast enough to create a saw effect and rip your screen, this mainly only happens if I forget to remove tape that covers the regi marks or pin holes.
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dumb question - you aren't smoking while printing are you? ashes make burn holes.
maybe something in the ink, was it while printing the same color in both cases? I have had a bolt fall out of the chopper right into my ink -only to find it while putting ink back in the bucket. . .or junk on the pallet punching up through.
I also like Wayne's solution. . .
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dumb question - you aren't smoking while printing are you? ashes make burn holes.
maybe something in the ink, was it while printing the same color in both cases? I have had a bolt fall out of the chopper right into my ink -only to find it while putting ink back in the bucket. . .or junk on the pallet punching up through.
I also like Wayne's solution. . .
Awhile back the jerk-offs that own the building sandblasted the outside walls, I had few windows open I had sand particals everywhere all over my shiiit and in some of my inks. I'm still finding ink with sand and I'll know when the screen starts to rip. Bitched at my landlord and he thought it was funny... Moral of the story... keep your inks covered lol. If your roadside , road dust and particals can kick up into the air as well.
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picture
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Looks like something sharp in your ink?
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picture
This is the last one I was using about 40 prints in this appeared. I was using cci stuff to clean them
then switched to Franmar the screens that had the holes were all cleaned with the franmar stuff before coating. I would say at most there would be 3000 prints off of them with maybe 4-5 different designs. 2 screens were from GM 2 from Ryonet. Last night I looked over everything that touches the screens and found nothing. I even looked at my scoop coater thinking that it might have a nick on it or something. I was thinking it was more a chemical weakening of the screen. I now have a dip tank and use 701 after the high pressure cleaning and have not had any issues on the screens that were cleaned with that. I have popped holes in the screen by bumping it into things but these happened while printing mid stroke if you will. Only one was near an active flash unit while being used. The last one was 110 mesh one color black ink ( I know I should use a higher mesh to save ink) 70 durometer squeegee I used a wood paint stick to apply the ink on the screen. I thought maybe that was the issue but they are all rounded edges and very smooth.
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Looks like something sharp in your ink?
I would think that but it happened with different color inks, different squeegees and even on two different presses. I did clean the screen with the 909 cleaner could that mess it up?
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It takes a pretty caustic cleaner (like lye style haze removers) to destroy a screen, and then depending on tension, I usually see a real rip, rendering the screen useless.
These look like pretty small holes.
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It takes a pretty caustic cleaner (like lye style haze removers) to destroy a screen, and then depending on tension, I usually see a real rip, rendering the screen useless.
These look like pretty small holes.
agreed, as Frog said, these look like rips. What's a 909?
pierre
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It takes a pretty caustic cleaner (like lye style haze removers) to destroy a screen, and then depending on tension, I usually see a real rip, rendering the screen useless.
These look like pretty small holes.
agreed, as Frog said, these look like rips. What's a 909?
pierre
909 heavy duty orange power degreaser I was told its good to use on press to open screens and clean up ink, it works great CCI makes it. Last night I was looking for big things maybe I need to think little and reinspect everything a little better to verify there is nothing amiss
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After looking at the pic, I'm sticking with my friction/fire story ;)
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So, I'm printing the backs of Port & Co. zip up sweats last night and I start noticing little flakes of metal on the fabric, no problems yet but I'm sure this isn't a good thing. They have to be from the zippers and this is the first time ever I have seen this.
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So a couple hundred shirts printed no issues. I must have not appeased the printing gods that month, but now after sacrificing 2 shirts to the dryer god and 3 to the inky thumb god everything has been ok.
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dumb question - you aren't smoking while printing are you? ashes make burn holes.
maybe something in the ink, was it while printing the same color in both cases? I have had a bolt fall out of the chopper right into my ink -only to find it while putting ink back in the bucket. . .or junk on the pallet punching up through.
I also like Wayne's solution. . .
I was going to say, clean out the seeds before you roll...
Steve
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I retire screens when they're getting paid too much and could be easily replaced with younger, less-experienced screens willing to work for lower wages and less or no benefits. Oh wait, I got myself confused with every place of employment in America right now.
Based on the totally grainy and almost indiscernible photo you posted I have no effing clue why this is happening. Can we get a better pic?
Also, is this only happening in a certain area of each screen? And tell us about how you dry the screens after coating as well as how you handle jobs with flashing...
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Heres what I've been told by an industry supply guy in the know. Used to be the Swiss mesh was superior to the Asian. The Asians got smarter and better at it and now the reverse is true. Supposedly the Europeans (Swiss) have to cheapen the spec on their mesh in order to compete with the Asian pricing. Not sure how or even if this true but I'm seeing this hole phenomenem as well. Moving forward I will be building a stretching table and bring this back under my control.