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screen printing => Screen Making => Topic started by: Printficient on May 26, 2011, 05:21:08 PM
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Direct to screen. What are the advantages? What amount of screens a week make it worth while? Which units do you recommend? Let it all out.
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When they work they are good and avoid using film.
BUT...They are a bottleneck in the workflow and if they are out of use then you have a problem.
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When they work they are good and avoid using film.
BUT...They are a bottleneck in the workflow and if they are out of use then you have a problem.
There is a shop that has 2 Kiwo units that go through 800 to 1000 screens a day.
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I have had a Kiwo I-Jet for four years. We are running one shift and doing up to 150 screens pretty easily. Our set up is one person images, exposes, develops, and tapes up screens. A good person can do all this plus coat screens. (OK we have a coating machine, so we can coat and image at the same time) I know three other shops that have the same brand machine, and they all feel the same as me....this machine alone has helped us grow. I have never experienced more than a few hours of down time, and that has been rare. Perhaps three times? Since we image a day ahead, even a little down time won't kill me. It may be a strain, but it won't shut us down. As far as a bottle neck, I'd beg to differ. Imagine life without film. Everything is digital, stored on servers (and backed up of course) A few keystrokes and you have your files. I will go into much more detail later, but have to split for now. I will also search for a few articles on the subject. Throw your questions and opinions my way. I'll answer and respond as best I can.
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I have had a Kiwo I-Jet for four years. We are running one shift and doing up to 150 screens pretty easily. Our set up is one person images, exposes, develops, and tapes up screens. A good person can do all this plus coat screens. (OK we have a coating machine, so we can coat and image at the same time) I know three other shops that have the same brand machine, and they all feel the same as me....this machine alone has helped us grow. I have never experienced more than a few hours of down time, and that has been rare. Perhaps three times? Since we image a day ahead, even a little down time won't kill me. It may be a strain, but it won't shut us down. As far as a bottle neck, I'd beg to differ. Imagine life without film. Everything is digital, stored on servers (and backed up of course) A few keystrokes and you have your files. I will go into much more detail later, but have to split for now. I will also search for a few articles on the subject. Throw your questions and opinions my way. I'll answer and respond as best I can.
At what cost for answers? 1 beer 2 beers? ;D ;D ;D ;D
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For you Sonny, only a 12 pack.
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No vaccuum or glass needed for exposure. This drastically reduces the time on exposures. How about 75% quicker exposures? The dmax value of the wax KIWO uses allows you to fully expose the screens without lower percentage dot loss and fully exposed screens will also benefit when it comes time for reclaim. Say good-bye to pinholes too.
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An excellent product that eliminates many problems with imaging stencils...
It is amazing how the elimination of glass, vac, positive film, aid in the formation of the photo-reactive stencil.
One of the “next-step” items for the industry that just seems to be a sleeper for the moment.
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Side question: what about projection? Is that completely dead?
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Side question: what about projection? Is that completely dead?
No, but almost.
There are even direct-to-stencil inkjet printers large enough to take the place of some if not most of the projection methods.
One emulsion used exclusively for projection - the only existing example of the sixth type of emulsion (photopolymer only) was dropped from the market by ulano over 4 years ago...
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Side question: what about projection? Is that completely dead?
No, but almost.
There are even direct-to-stencil inkjet printers large enough to take the place of some if not most of the projection methods.
One emulsion used exclusively for projection - the only existing example of the sixth type of emulsion (photopolymer only) was dropped from the market by ulano over 4 years ago...
what about laser? Douglas and Sonny, any experience with those systems?
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The next evolution which needs to happen with DTS is "mesh awareness".
With the speed of todays computers, it is possible to add a camera to the head of the DTS printer and gain awareness of where the mesh exists, then modify the output accordingly. Screen moires would be eliminated and individual screen cells could be accessed directly. This would allow "dithered" output at mesh resolutions.
If it were my design, i'd be using an inkjet printer and a single point light source. this choice would be made for both speed and halftone control within a mesh cell. The downside to a laser, is that it takes as much light energy to expose an emulsion, with a laser or with a big bulb. In about 1 minute, i can expose the entire screen, where mesh cell by mesh cell, each cell still needs total of that same 1 minute of light.
In the future, LCD technology may make a resurrection of projection, I'm not seeing it on the horizon.
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regarding LAser units: Last year I was shopping for DTS. Kiwo offered me their older model of ScreenSetter, which uses Laser. It's price was 150.000$ for used 2003 unit which they had in stock. Now they all use DMD units for high end applications. It means thousands of micromirrors that change angle and thus reflect light or not. But all these cheaper DMD units were over 200.000$ with no big difference in quality vs. ink jets.
Finally we bought ink jet unit based on Epson 9880.
Ease of use:
Person running it, never used computer before. It took me half an hour to learn her.
Ink is very stable. After initial installation i got ill for over a month. Nobody even turned it on for nearly two month. I just started it, printed nozzle test and not a single nozzle was missing.
Running costs:
It's cheap to run. We make roughly 600 screens with image size 45x65cm with one liter of ink that costs 200$ Printhead costs around 800$ but I don't know for how many mil of droplets it will work.
Reliabilty:
No downtime yet, but we use it only since this January.
We started using it for Transfer department only. And I am super happy about this investment. Actually monthly Invoice for film and chemistry for imagesetter equals monthly payment for CTS unit.
After the rain (of orders) season we make switch in direct printing. And that will save as ton of time.. But I started with part of production that was easier to adapt. It was easier because of workflow we use there and because my transfer printers are less stubborn. Now after half a year ludditism movement is slowly dying and we can move on.
I believe only KIWO and CST are making units using all three different technologies. DMD, wax, inkjet.
For some general technology info here is link to Kiwo's website dedicated to DTS or CTS:
http://www.computertoscreen.com/index.html (http://www.computertoscreen.com/index.html)
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Speed:
It takes 8 min to image screen with image that's 45x65 cm. We print at 720x720 dpi.
Quality:
We print 65lpi halftones and they look ok. Dots are not as sharp and round as when using imagesetter, but after you apply transfer to T-shirt you don't see this difference anymore. On paper and with magnifier there is notable difference. But we wash out 5% dots easier.
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Speed:
It takes 8 min to image screen with image that's 45x65 cm. We print at 720x720 dpi.
Quality:
We print 65lpi halftones and they look ok. Dots are not as sharp and round as when using imagesetter, but after you apply transfer to T-shirt you don't see this difference anymore. On paper and with magnifier there is notable difference. But we wash out 5% dots easier.
this is interesting! I always wondered what the deal is with the smaller dots. Few ppl I talked to said they were now seeing much smaller dots open up. The problem is I don't know what they were holding before the switch. My fear was that they could only hold a 6-8% dot and are now seeing a considerable improvement. In my case, we are holding a 3% dot on 330's and we are limited by the mesh. Many ppl said I would see improvement in halftones by switching, and I am starting to question that. Yes, I would not lose anything and potentially the dots could be crisper since there is no film to scatter the light, but . . .
What kind of imagesetter did you use before the CTS?
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We are using Screen FTR-3050. We image films at 1500 dpi. For Transfers we are using 82dpi for 4c.process transfers, and between 35 and 65 for different kind of other halftone transfers. We can expose and washout most dots of 82dpi 5% on 355 mesh.
With our DTS/CST unit we don't get equal quality at 65dpi or higher frequency. We can still improve, but i think we will not be able to match what we did before. Our unit can print 1440x1440 dpi. But this still can't compare even to 1000dpi film from imagesetter.
If you fine tune exposure time, using top exposure unit, make low Rz screen with high resolution emulsion, you beat all CTS units that textile printers can buy. Only super good DMD ($$$$$) units can beat your screens.
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Boris, that is really awesome information you're sharing. This is the kind of stuff that is missed all the time in the discussions on technology like this.
Thanks!
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I have had a Kiwo I-Jet for four years. We are running one shift and doing up to 150 screens pretty easily. Our set up is one person images, exposes, develops, and tapes up screens. A good person can do all this plus coat screens. (OK we have a coating machine, so we can coat and image at the same time) I know three other shops that have the same brand machine, and they all feel the same as me....this machine alone has helped us grow. I have never experienced more than a few hours of down time, and that has been rare. Perhaps three times? Since we image a day ahead, even a little down time won't kill me. It may be a strain, but it won't shut us down. As far as a bottle neck, I'd beg to differ. Imagine life without film. Everything is digital, stored on servers (and backed up of course) A few keystrokes and you have your files. I will go into much more detail later, but have to split for now. I will also search for a few articles on the subject. Throw your questions and opinions my way. I'll answer and respond as best I can.
I've seen it in action at Bimm Ridder. It's a pretty sweet set-up.
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Something you may find interesting - the output from the Oyo product on a screen.
It is difficult to catch a snap from a microscope that will get the sides and show the depth.
This is the best I could do at 100 and 200 magnification to catch the layer and emulsion before exposing the stencil.
(http://i60.photobucket.com/albums/h40/douglasgrigar/Oyo_DTS_100.jpg)
(http://i60.photobucket.com/albums/h40/douglasgrigar/Oyo_DTS_200.jpg)
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Something you may find interesting - the output from the Oyo product on a screen.
It is difficult to catch a snap from a microscope that will get the sides and show the depth.
This is the best I could do at 100 and 200 magnification to catch the layer and emulsion before exposing the stencil.
do you know what size and lpi are those? They remind me of the AccuRIP dots I was getting before using Film Maker. Not as bad as the big ones in those pix, but very lumpy. I described them as "potatoes" and the ones from FM as blackberries. Neither were smooth like an imagesetter, but AR's were pretty lumpy. . .
is that wax? What are the lines going through the dots? Was the head scraping across?
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I'm guessing those lines are the ridges/knuckles of the mesh that the light is reflecting off of.
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Something you may find interesting - the output from the Oyo product on a screen.
It is difficult to catch a snap from a microscope that will get the sides and show the depth.
This is the best I could do at 100 and 200 magnification to catch the layer and emulsion before exposing the stencil.
do you know what size and lpi are those? They remind me of the AccuRIP dots I was getting before using Film Maker. Not as bad as the big ones in those pix, but very lumpy. I described them as "potatoes" and the ones from FM as blackberries. Neither were smooth like an imagesetter, but AR's were pretty lumpy. . .
is that wax? What are the lines going through the dots? Was the head scraping across?
I did not print that, it was from Oyo at a show I would bet it is 55 to 65 lpi
It is a wax thermal transfer.
No head scraping, the wax in on sheets on a roll and the head goes over the wax not the emulsion.
No inkjet or thermal will ever get the dots a 2000 plus silver film imagesetter can get.
The benefits of DTS are speed and lack of positive material - including faster exposure because the glass is not blocking some of the UV.
The Oyo is very, very fast - it will lay down that wax in less than half the time an inkjet would take.
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I'm guessing those lines are the ridges/knuckles of the mesh that the light is reflecting off of.
Hard to identify for sure but I think you are correct - it is possible it is the thermal grid.
Very fast to print.
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Oyo's Diablo was very, very fast, cheaper to buy than I-jet or our C-S-T unit and quality was better.
But, at the time when I was getting their information, price for square meter of ribbon was 10$. And it always runs full width no matter if your image is just long thin line of text along moving direction. When I calculated, price of ribbon per screen was double our silver film price.
Printhead should last 3-5 years. It better does, because it was 8500$ when I asked.
From what i read and i don't remember where, they are very sensitive regarding air humidity. But that remains unconfirmed from Mark.
He setup a blog, which is mostly inactive.
http://oyoblogger.blogspot.com/ (http://oyoblogger.blogspot.com/)
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Oyo's Diablo was very, very fast, cheaper to buy than I-jet or our C-S-T unit and quality was better.
But, at the time when I was getting their information, price for square meter of ribbon was 10$. And it always runs full width no matter if your image is just long thin line of text along moving direction. When I calculated, price of ribbon per screen was double our silver film price.
Printhead should last 3-5 years. It better does, because it was 8500$ when I asked.
From what i read and i don't remember where, they are very sensitive regarding air humidity. But that remains unconfirmed from Mark.
He setup a blog, which is mostly inactive.
[url]http://oyoblogger.blogspot.com/[/url] ([url]http://oyoblogger.blogspot.com/[/url])
Ok just so i'm clear on what you said. You think the Diablo is faster and higher quality than the Kiwo i-Jet? What is the unit you have? Thanks!
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I believe so. But I have seen them on tradeshows only not in shops. I looked at their prints with magnifiying glass.
I need to be able to print screens in max size 120x80 cm. What we have is this:
http://www.kopimask.com/productos/TDS%20CST%20DTS%20INKJET%20ENGRAVER%20%28in%29.pdf (http://www.kopimask.com/productos/TDS%20CST%20DTS%20INKJET%20ENGRAVER%20%28in%29.pdf)
Producer is german Company CST gmbH www.c-s.t.eu (http://www.c-s.t.eu). Yes I know they don't believe in power of Internet.
They manufacture machines using all three available technologies, and most likely they made most installations. More than 200 by the time I was in their factory.
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OK, I'll start with a few things and see where this goes. I will not get into a pissing match about companies or products. I know my machine pretty well, but not others. We bought our Kiwo I-Jet when we were getting close to 100 screens a day. I think even 75 a day would be worth looking at CTS. We run everything on 23X31 Newman M3 frames, so the machine stays the same. (No changing drums) Imaging obviously depend on the size of the image. Most of out stuff will take between 30 and 120 seconds to image. I can do some dead nuts timing if anyone wants me to. The cost per screen to image is between eight and twenty five cents. This is my second machine. (The first was destroyed in a flood) We've been running an I-jet for almost exactly 4 1/2 years right now. I haven't had a head go, but I know it will. At $5,000, that's a hefty expense. But we built that in to the ROI, figuring one head per year to be on the safe side. I do have a new head sitting in my office so when the one on the machine goes, I can be up and running in an hour. We make our screens a day ahead of production, so if I do have a problem with the machine. I still have a day to fix it. Question for you all. Everyone says, "when it breaks down, you're screwed." Isn't that the same with a vacuum table, exposure lamp, press, or dryer? Just saying, it's a machine like every other one in your shop. I keep some basic parts and the head on hand to cover as h of my ass as I can. While we don't do some of the crazy good process work Pierre and some others here do, we do a little. We print 65 line. I can hold and print a 3-4% dot. I find that very acceptable, so I haven't pushed for anything higher. Someday when I have some time to play, I will. The machine has a Harlequin RIP. You guys can tell me more about that than I can tell you. I do know we adjusted things on installation so that we were printing a particular dot size called for by the art department. (were they adjusting curves?) I'll leave it at this point for now. If you want more, just ask. I don't sell the thing, I just use it so I'll be honest and up front about everything.
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OK, I'll start with a few things and see where this goes. I will not get into a pissing match about companies or products. I know my machine pretty well, but not others.
I don’t think anyone is saying the I-jet is a bad machine, in fact I think it is a reasonable choice I just happen to have photos of the other machine, I have yet been able to get micro photos of the I-jet output - the shops I deal with are almost all newbies and upgrades where DTS is not an option. I have yet to come across one in the wild with a client’s shop.
Far removed that I would be in a position to say anything bad about DTS - it may well be our "saving grace” in the near future (industry speaking).
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I want a DTS so bad. I've seen most of them in person but none of them were operating except the Kiwo I-jet II. I saw the Douthitt online and then thought to myself that it looks really familiar and then found a video of the original Kiwo I-jet and they look identical. Does anyone know the deal with the Kiwo and Douthitt? If we decided to go with the Douthitt, would we simply be buying the old, maybe outdated/under performing original Kiwo that they've moved on from?
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I on the other hand have heard that the Kiwo is the unit to have albeit at a little more money then the rest. Also some of the math was showing the CTS to be effective at as little as 20 screens per day if set up right.
as far as buying a used one, it would be like buying a used auto. For a first time around, there are waaay to many high precision moving parts to start with a used one. I know I am pretty close to 20 screens per day and I don't think the savings are here yet. As a new shop, we are still to disorganized to benefit from something like it. My guess, 40-50 screens (per day) will be the number for us.
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I don't know all of the particulars, but I believe Olec builds the unit that is being sold by Douthitt and Olec. I believe this is also the unit formerly sold by Kiwo as the I-jet. http://www.olec.com/DSI-CTS.html (http://www.olec.com/DSI-CTS.html)
I heard somewhere that the I-jet II is made by a company in Canada, but that's just what I remember hearing somewhere.
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Richmond Graphic is their promoting their Direct Jet Pro as an affordable machine. But no technical data on their webpage.
All that John52 said who is producing what is correct. Olec is Manufacturer for Douthitt and Olec units, and unknown Canadians for I-Jet II, which I liked very much.
Any of these machines will bring busy shop to new level. Also the original I-Jets and Olec's DSI-CTS.
Most of the time we screenprinters use slightly outdated technology if compared to other printers.
I still remember my first trade show. It was DRUPA in 1995, and it's biggest printing trade show in Europe that really gathers all big names in printing industry. Heidelberg had one medium sized building just for themselves. Anyway, one experienced, kind exhibitor took time to talk a lot to me, total rookie then. He described screen printing as poor cousin of printing family.
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He described screen printing as poor cousin of printing family.
Sometimes that feels like red-headded step-child.
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I don't know all of the particulars, but I believe Olec builds the unit that is being sold by Douthitt and Olec. I believe this is also the unit formerly sold by Kiwo as the I-jet. [url]http://www.olec.com/DSI-CTS.html[/url] ([url]http://www.olec.com/DSI-CTS.html[/url])
I heard somewhere that the I-jet II is made by a company in Canada, but that's just what I remember hearing somewhere.
To bad OLEC has anything to do with it. OLEC sucks. Great lamps but lousy customer service.. if you can call it that. Check their website, more than half of the email addresses on the website bounce. OLEC just seems sketchy at best.
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He described screen printing as poor cousin of printing family.
Sometimes that feels like red-headded step-child.
way funnier analogy! ;D
and my hair was more than once covered in GNS super red
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As far as service, you're right, Olec doesn't have any. Both Kiwo and Douthitt have good and reliable service people.
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So what are the Richmond units going for?
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So what are the Richmond units going for?
I want to say their normal machine was $70k and their entry levels were $40-$50k.
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So Sonny, I'm curious what your thought are on the whole CTS thing...since you asked.
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He thinks they are awesome.
That's my guess anyway.
If somebody came out with a $10-$15,000 machine, they would sell the piss out of it. As long as it wasn't a hunk of junk like the one that US Screen tried.
Heck, I say this like I know what I am doing, but it shouldn't be THAT hard to make one. People make DTG machines, so why not a CTS machine? Same concept, different substrate.
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One small difference would be the head,at least on mine.The Douthitt and Kiwo use a wax, not an ink or dye.
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Ahh, I was wondering how the ink stuck.
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If somebody came out with a $10-$15,000 machine, they would sell the piss out of it. As long as it wasn't a hunk of junk like the one that US Screen tried.
Heck, I say this like I know what I am doing, but it shouldn't be THAT hard to make one. People make DTG machines, so why not a CTS machine? Same concept, different substrate.
I found them expensive too. Then i tried to find flatbed ink jet that prints on sheets. They were all too big and as a consequence too expensive. Too bad Mimaki's UJF-706 wasn't out then. It's definitely worth to try it out for printing on screens. All you need to do is buy the right ink. No spreading on emulsion, fast drying and superb UV blocking properties.
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Sonny, I was just glancing at some numbers I track, and one is how often I add wax to the I-Jet. I also track numbers of screens imaged per day. I'm coming up with an average of 350 screens per cube of wax. This comes out to ten cents per screen in wax. Now, the image areas vary widely from infant size prints to adult full front, so I can only give you an average. I thought this number might be something you'd like to have. My usual disclaimer: These are numbers in my shop, with my equipment, in my systems. Your results may vary. Anything else Sonny?
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Just as a FYI our i-image does about 150 23X31 screens per day and the ink cost is averaging .07 per screen. The i-image sells for $39,995.
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And everything I've seen with the i-image is great. When we bought the I-jet, I think the i-image was still in its infancy. I'd certainly look at it if I was buying now. There are others I wouldn't look at if they were free.
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Just as a FYI our i-image does about 150 23X31 screens per day and the ink cost is averaging .07 per screen. The i-image sells for $39,995.
Rich can you get us some more info on it?
What type of ink is it and what are the screen sizes/prices for different models. How fast is it? And anything else you'd like to throw in.
pierre
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We had the 19th I-Screen made I think is what I was told and we love it. It took a while to figure out. That was a rough job for me for a while, but now we crank out 150+ screen a day on it. We also bought a tri-lite cts at the same time and now are burning 4 screens at a time in about 18 seconds. We hired 2 more artists just to keep up (now we have 11 total)
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Sonny, I was just glancing at some numbers I track, and one is how often I add wax to the I-Jet. I also track numbers of screens imaged per day. I'm coming up with an average of 350 screens per cube of wax. This comes out to ten cents per screen in wax. Now, the image areas vary widely from infant size prints to adult full front, so I can only give you an average. I thought this number might be something you'd like to have. My usual disclaimer: These are numbers in my shop, with my equipment, in my systems. Your results may vary. Anything else Sonny?
Nope. Sounds like this subject was pretty well discussed. On to a new project that some know about. More news in the next couple of weeks. Look for a new post in .....
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Here's another great thing about CTS. In our market, we do a lot of playoff and championship printing. It's very common to have a number of "If Win" orders lurking on desk tops. A few days ago, we started the day with a normal schedule, and by 9:00 AM we had 15 "We won" orders that had to print and ship that day. We knew these were possible, so the art was all done and approved. All we had to do was make the screens, print, and ship. I think if we would have had to make film, it may have been less likely that we would have finished all of them. It was a little tough, but we got all of them done, plus the days schedule, too. Just one of those intangibles that may be over looked.