Discuss the various aspects of heat press technology. Transfer paper, inks, plastisol transfers, vinyl cutters, printers, commercial usage, durability, suppliers, etc.
Well I've already made one expensive mistake I think. I bought an Epson 3000 Large Format Printer which has terrible paper feed problems. It cost me £270 (about $540) and I kind of regret buying it now.
But that was for the poster sized prints on canvas.
I wanted a printer that would print on transfer paper that I could then heat press onto T-shirts and clothing too.
I decided that there was no real reason to go with dye sublimation for this and that I'd go with pigment inks and the Epson Stylus D92 with a CISS.
I wanted to just get something to print with pigment inks so that it would work with cotton (rather than sublimation inks for the polyester and polymer coated fabrics).
But it says 'sub dye ink' on it and I don't understand how it can be so cheap if it is sub dye ink - I thought that was suposed to be more expensive than that?
I guess what I'm really asking here is can I use these inks (in the above link) to print in the Epson D92 Printer (with a CISS) onto transfer paper that I can then heat press onto 100% cotton T-shirts.
Sorry for rambling on. I do that when I'm speaking too...
Thanks in advance again - the advice on this place has been without compare so far!
Last edited by Harison; September 23rd, 2008 at 01:59 PM.
Reason: typo
Hi. I think the listing for the inks is just a spelling mistake. There is no such thing as pigment sublimation ink. Sublimation ink is dye based. The inks seem VERY cheap though, so be prepared for the quality to be borderline. Good quality third party inks would cost you about £30 to £40 for a set of four.
I have a D92 printer with a CIS and have had no problems at all with it. It's not the fastest of printers, but it gives good quality output. You may find the CIS tubes jamming the printer at first, as there is not a lot of room inside the casing.
I too used to own an Epson 3000. They are a brilliant printer for large format, but they are notorious for the printheads clogging. I used mine for art canvas and the paper feed is really vicious on those things. The Hewlett Packard Designjets are best for that type of print on canvas.
Thanks Will. I also wanted to use the Epson 3000 for printing on Canvas. But when the paper feed won't work it can take me several hours of trying before it finally feeds and sometimes I just give up and can't do anything with it.
It's so frustrating. I could never run a business with a piece of equipment that was so unreliable. So we've decided to put the canvas-printing on the 'back burner' for now and concentrate on the T-shirts and baby-clothes.
I'm not sure what to do with the printer now. £270 is a lot of money to us right now - plus the £30 or so in petrol to travel and pick it up makes £300 of money that we really couldn't afford to have wasted like that.
Still, at we at least made a good buy with the heat press! That is a purchase I don't regret!
I just want to get started now. The heat press is sitting there unused and I'm feeling impatient to start using it!
I think I'll keep looking for some pigment based inks that are a bit more expensive then maybe.
At first I was thinking that the cheaper ink would be better (at this stage of my knowledge and experience) as I'm bound to make lots of mistakes at first and it wouldn't matter so much with the cheaper ink... But then I thought that if the ink is going to last for months I might be stuck with sub-standard T-shirts until it runs out!
My brain is starting to hurt now, but thanks again- good advice as always!
After reading, reading, reading and filling my poor little brain up as much as I can with the great info available here (I love this place!) I've decided that despite the extra cost I'm going to use sublimation inks with this printer instead.
We've already spent around £850 on the equipment we've bought so far. We might as well spend the extra for the sublimation inks, I keep hearing such good stuff about it.
We're going to get a mug press so we might as well just start off with the sublimation inks anyway.
I looked on Ebay to see who else had bought the sublimation inks that I was looking at, and I found one person who not only bought them, but gave them a good review, and he even bought the same printer that I have just bought (the epson d92) and a load of sublimation mugs! Not hard to work out what he does for fun or business!
So I took note of the transfer paper that he bought too and intend to buy the same brand (as his set-up seems similar to mine, so if it works for his it should work for mine)
HI. Your Epson 3000 will feed through canvas more easily if you put two thin strips of 1" masking running lengthways along the canvas. Make sure you tuck it over the leading edge, so it doesn't wrap around the feed rollers. It takes a while to get used to the feed on the Epson 3000, but once you've cracked it, you'll get superb prints onto A2.
Good to see you doing some research on printers. The D92 is a brilliant little printer, despite its small format and relatively slow speed.
Once Sawgrass see those bogus sublimation inks on EBay they will have the listing pulled and threaten the seller with legal action, as they own the patent to sublimation inks, for smaller printers. Effectively that means you can only use genuine Sawgrass inks in smaller printers. A lot of the non Sawgrass inks originate from China and with some of them you will find it difficult to match the ink colours without a colour profile. A set of Sawgrass inks will set you back about £220. That is the downside of sublimation, the inks are very expensive and you are basically tied to buying from one manufacturer.
After reading, reading, reading and filling my poor little brain up as much as I can with the great info available here (I love this place!) I've decided that despite the extra cost I'm going to use sublimation inks with this printer instead.
We've already spent around £850 on the equipment we've bought so far. We might as well spend the extra for the sublimation inks, I keep hearing such good stuff about it.
We're going to get a mug press so we might as well just start off with the sublimation inks anyway.
I looked on Ebay to see who else had bought the sublimation inks that I was looking at, and I found one person who not only bought them, but gave them a good review, and he even bought the same printer that I have just bought (the epson d92) and a load of sublimation mugs! Not hard to work out what he does for fun or business!
So I took note of the transfer paper that he bought too and intend to buy the same brand (as his set-up seems similar to mine, so if it works for his it should work for mine)
They're the best price I've found so far, and they seem to work for his D92 so they should work for mine.
Hi , with the sublimation mugs there is another way to get the image onto the mug without using a mug press . You could get a mug wrap and see how it all works out . A wrap is like a stretchy bit of rubber you clamp around the mug and put it into the oven so it heats up . The advantage is that the heating elements on mug presses have a limited life so sooner or later will need to be replaced and I have bought a mug press on Ebay that is difficult to adjust the pressure on . Another mug press I bought had a faulty element and burnt itself out quickly . Just an idea , one more thing I press on aluminium stubby coolers ( Drink Coolers ) also and I found they work better with the mug wrap . Hope it all goes well
HI. Your Epson 3000 will feed through canvas more easily if you put two thin strips of 1" masking running lengthways along the canvas. Make sure you tuck it over the leading edge, so it doesn't wrap around the feed rollers. It takes a while to get used to the feed on the Epson 3000, but once you've cracked it, you'll get superb prints onto A2.
Good to see you doing some research on printers. The D92 is a brilliant little printer, despite its small format and relatively slow speed.
Once Sawgrass see those bogus sublimation inks on EBay they will have the listing pulled and threaten the seller with legal action, as they own the patent to sublimation inks, for smaller printers. Effectively that means you can only use genuine Sawgrass inks in smaller printers. A lot of the non Sawgrass inks originate from China and with some of them you will find it difficult to match the ink colours without a colour profile. A set of Sawgrass inks will set you back about £220. That is the downside of sublimation, the inks are very expensive and you are basically tied to buying from one manufacturer.
Hope this helps.
Thanks Will, that does help me, really. I had no idea about the patent on sublimation inks either.
If we have to spend a bit more money to get the right equipment and inks then I guess that's what we'll have to do. I want to do this right.
One of the great bits of advice I read on here was to work out how much money it would cost and then add a lot more money to that figure... It's so true!
I estimated how much money it would cost and the time-frame but when we have to spend more money then we have to extend the time frame too, because we have to wait till we find the extra money before we proceed!
Ah Well. I'm sure Richard Branson (or whoever you admire) didn't get to where they are by giving up when they hit a problem.
I'll just have to wait till we can afford the proper inks (another week or so) and in the meantime keep working on the website and keep reading, reading, reading...
Hi , with the sublimation mugs there is another way to get the image onto the mug without using a mug press . You could get a mug wrap and see how it all works out . A wrap is like a stretchy bit of rubber you clamp around the mug and put it into the oven so it heats up . The advantage is that the heating elements on mug presses have a limited life so sooner or later will need to be replaced and I have bought a mug press on Ebay that is difficult to adjust the pressure on . Another mug press I bought had a faulty element and burnt itself out quickly . Just an idea , one more thing I press on aluminium stubby coolers ( Drink Coolers ) also and I found they work better with the mug wrap . Hope it all goes well
Thanks Bernie, I've heard of mug wraps but I've been so busy with other things that I haven't done any research at all on them.
I think I will do though. The more information the better, right?
One of the great bits of advice I read on here was to work out how much money it would cost and then add a lot more money to that figure... It's so true!
I estimated how much money it would cost and the time-frame but when we have to spend more money then we have to extend the time frame too, because we have to wait till we find the extra money before we proceed!
Hi. The extra costs you need to budget for can be quite significant. It is the cost of all the little things you suddenly find yourself needing, that really ramps up the costs.
As well as your initial setup costs, you need to ensure you have some working capital at hand as well. If your printer or heat press suddenly packs in, you need to have the money to get a replacement straight away.
If you can, try putting whatever you earn in the first three months, to one side for future investment in your business.
Will these inks work with this printer? 
That is a purchase I don't regret!
