Well, sometimes mesh just bust I guess.

[Gilligan]

I had an mzx that Alan made up for me with some S Thread and tensioned to about 20'ish.  We had it ride back in the car with us from Alan's (7 hours), then we printed on it once and reclaimed it.  It has been sitting for a couple of weeks now and poof!  No one has even touched it and there is no burr or anything on the frame.

Yay!, was gonna use that in a couple of days. *sigh*

[mooseman]

This sometimes happens, we see this every once in a while. One actually scared the crapppppp out of me it was sitting on the floor leaning up against a cabinet the mesh just popped all at once and the frame made a noise against the cabinet...never even touched it it just went BANG.
This is what we diacovered on our screens and believe it or not we have actually watched this happen just out of curiosity.

Sometimes you will hear (while tensioning) a thread or two snap or le go. Nothing happens at that point but in a little time another one or two will let go. When this happens the overall tension of the screen does not change but the threads all around the failed threads carry more load and the vector of the load changes. They let go one or two more than things start to accelerate and you get a real nice run down the screen usually in an accute angle.

So most likely the mesh was damaged in handling transport, moving around in your shop etc just a thread or two but that is all it takes.
A picture of the tear would tell us a lot.
Bottom line is it just  happens sometimes, but my guess is the mesh was scratched or damaged somewhere over its short life.

RIP punn intended
mooseman

[alan802]

I think I know why that one busted.  I can see something in that pic you sent.  Did you have another screen leaning up against it at any point?  We've had screens bust that didn't have any protective tape on them that looked exactly like that.  The backside of another screen was resting up against  it and where the mesh is against the roller like that, it takes very little to bust it.  We always put the polyken tape around the frame for that very reason.

[Gilligan]

Well, it was an M3 that was leaned against it.  So there was actually nothing touching it at that point since the M3 is so much larger.

So I don't THINK that was the reason... now they have been leaned against by some static wood frames previously I'm sure... and gorilla Terry had reclaimed it while I wasn't around.  So it's possible that he was a little rougher than he should.  This will definitely give him a cause for pause there.  I sent him that pic at the same time and he flipped out, knowing it was just sitting there.  If he doesn't get it now how sensative these things are I think I'll kick him in the teeth.

[alan802]

Do you have any polyken tape yet?  Just regular duct tape from lowes will help protect it.

[JBLUE]

When a screen is at a higher tension it does not take much. Just pressure from another screen is enough to bust it sometimes.

[Gilligan]

Not yet Alan... though I REALLY need some.

J'... I agree, but the M3 isn't even touching on the inside of the MZX (pretty much impossible given the size difference).

[mooseman]

Get Gorilla tape from Lowes, $9.00 / roll we do not dip tank and we are at 3 m onths on the tape and it loos 100%
mooseman

[Gilligan]

BOOM!

My M3 just went.  Had a "nice" thick EOM that was under exposed and needed to be reclaimed but I wanted to see how thick the EOM was.  So I tossed it outside for a "quick" post exposure and went to lunch.

When I got back, the frame was pretty hot.  Stuck it back in the shop... granted probably 90 degrees but better than 100+ the frame had gotten.  Few seconds later I look and it split.  I'm guessing the expansion and contraction from heat was too much.

Le$$on learned.

[inkman996]

Are you stretching them your self? Wondering if your not softening them corners well enough, I would bet to much heat and under softened corners could spell doom.

[Gilligan]

Both of these were made up by Alan.  The m3 was done on a roller master and definitely had sloppy corners.

128n mesh at about 35 (MAYBE 30 newtons).

[ScreenPrinter123]

Raincloud meshed em?  I think we found the culprit

[alan802]

Oh damn, y'all gonna try to put that busted 128 on me, over a month after I stretched it?  I see, that's how it's gonna be, tough crowd.  I understand, but here's my argument, the corners were over softened so that they had plenty of room to retention and we didn't take that one up to near what I usually do.  I think we stopped at 40-45 or so and I could have gotten that count up to 60.  It wasnt at a delicate tension level, far from it so i dont think it could have busted from getting hot or cold.  It wasnt the corners, it would have busted long ago before it dropped its 10-15 newtons since it was stretched.  Was that the first run through production? 

We've had our share of busted screens over the last year, but zero of about 35 with bolt roller mesh and at 50-65 newtons have busted so I really don't think it happened from a bad stretching.  It would be the first of its kind to do so, but I'm not perfect, so close though

[ScreenFoo]

Hey now, not all of us.   

I'd bet it was mishandling.  I can't count how many times I've pointed out where a rip started--usually near a corner, tangent to the outer face of the screen, where another screen was carelessly stacked against it.  Sometimes on the long roller, coinciding with where a smaller static would hit the roller and start a rip.

I know it's not an option for many, but if you're just starting out with rollers, I'd do all the work on them yourself for a month or two--you'll actually know what's going on with them then.  If you have other people doing random things to your screens and not understanding the consequences, it will make you crazy trying to figure out what's wrong--because they didn't even know they screwed up...

[jsheridan]

Why am I not suprised to read yet another topic about failed S threads.

Change your mesh to standard threads and don't look back.