i have only done a little pretreating on light garments and find it very difficult getting a even coat. The auto pretreat machines look very nice, would a DIY Epson R1800 work for this ? you could make one just for pretreatment, load up the four white slots with pretreatment, then send a big square underbase to the printer, but would it work?
would enough pretreat be layed down ?
would the pretreatment itself run through the epson head ok ?
Because the pretreatment is like glue, it would not go through the print head and last very long. Of the auto pretreat machines I have seen, they use something with a much larger nozzle size. One of the pretreatment machines actually used the nozzles from a couple of Power Wagner Sprayers. So you might be better off looking at something like that. Good luck.
Mark is absolutely correct. The pretreatment is a sticky liquid which will immediately and permanently clog your inkjet print head. Keep in mind the size of the nozzles in the print head which are thinner then a human hair.
i thought that might be the case, just wanted to make sure before i went headlong into sending a 1800 to printhead heaven. i dont suppose anyone has heard anything in the pipeline somewhere along the line of a none pretreat white being released, rumours etc... ? im currently setup in a very small space and pretreating for white ink is almost impossible without risking airbourne harm to the printer etc.....
At this point, in order to print white ink on all the digital garment printers you have to apply pretreatment. That is the case for the foreseeable future.
As Harry's statement says, the next future is based on pretreatment, as the actual technology would need a big pigment size and high viscosity inks to print a good white without pretreatment. The epson printheads don't allow jetting that kind of ink. Even, if you use an industrial printhead capable of 150 picoliters, you could achieve some success with high pigmented ink, but go figure the resolution and detail with that point size.
Maybe in the next years, somebody develops an ink which reacts with the cotton or the poly fibers and turns white when touching them. Up today I've only heard of discharge inks, they're jettable but highly toxic, and don't works ok with every garment. They discharges the pigment on certain kind of fibers to obtain an underbase, never a good white.
i guessed as much, thanks for the info. does anyone out there use a none recommended way of applying the pretreatment with success? would say one of those mini sponge paint rollers work ? i already tried brushing it on but that was to inconsistent and took far to long to repeat on a regular basis.
Good idea about the spare printer, the problem is that even if it did work, it would take far longer for it to print the pre-treat than it would to quickly spray it down.
Also, you'd still have to press / dry the pre-treat after it's applied.
i wouldnt have minded the extra time to print it to get a consistent coat in my small space, i think i might look into getting one of theose anajet booths or something similar
i have only done a little pretreating on light garments and find it very difficult getting a even coat. The auto pretreat machines look very nice, would a DIY Epson R1800 work for this ? you could make one just for pretreatment, load up the four white slots with pretreatment, then send a big square underbase to the printer, but would it work?
would enough pretreat be layed down ?
would the pretreatment itself run through the epson head ok ?
I have better result with pretreat + 2CYMK print. I use Wagner. I called my supplier and ask the same question to them yesterday. He said there will be few problems.
Salt is major component in pretreatment. Printhead will clog at first attempt on Epson head.
Pretreat has to dry and push down before next ink layer apply for the best result.
But good thought! Thanks
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Salt is major component in pretreatment. Printhead will clog at first attempt on Epson head.
Pretreat has to dry and push down before next ink layer apply for the best result.
But good thought! Thanks
I'm curious if anybody knows the general chemical composition of "pretreatment" -- and what's the essential difference between pretreatment for whites/lights and the one for dark shirts?
I understand the basic effect -- once heat pressed, it glues down the fibers and creates a better print surface.
I know in inkjet photo printing that "photo paper" is coated with ceramic that's porous to absorb pigment, but resists bleeding that you'd get printing uncoated paper.
Does this stuff basically do the same for the surface of the shirt?
pretreatment reacts to the white ink and starts to "cure" it on direct contact.
I did have a couple of shirts yellowing with fastcolor when I did not cure them long enough.
my guess as to why big companies are not supplying pre-treated blanks is because the market id not large enough and you could run into problems with storage (moisture, dirt and dust).
...I did have a couple of shirts yellowing with fastcolor when I did not cure them long enough.
my guess as to why big companies are not supplying pre-treated blanks is because the market id not large enough and you could run into problems with storage (moisture, dirt and dust).
Good info on your experiences. And I'll bet your insight on the blanks is spot on. Thanks. Terry
Here's my idea:
Find a way to put the pretreatment on transfer-paper that can you can just press into the shirt (or wet onto the shirt like capillary film). I have neither the time nor the experience in chemical engineering to accomplish this feat, but whomever does can send me my royalty checks via PayPal.
Here's my idea:
Find a way to put the pretreatment on transfer-paper that can you can just press into the shirt (or wet onto the shirt like capillary film). I have neither the time nor the experience in chemical engineering to accomplish this feat, but whomever does can send me my royalty checks via PayPal.
This has already been talked about before, i believe someone said a couple of companies have attempted to develop such ideas
DIY Auto pretreatment? 
Re: DIY Auto pretreatment? 
