Hey I've been having a lot of problems with the inking of my shirts. I keep either getting too much ink on the shirt, or there wasnt enough ink. I also feel like Ive been using too much ink even when i dont get enough ink on my shirt..I dunno its puzzling me cause im using a lot of ink but its not spreading.... PLEASE HELP!
Without knowing any of the specific things you're doing, I can only guess at the two most common causes. Too much ink: off contact is too high. Too little ink: not doing a flood stroke before printing.
I'm a newbie and just started out with water-based ink (red and black) to print on white shirts.
I don't have a press and I don't use hinges (so basically I'm holding the frame while I make a printing stroke).
I do a flood stroke before hand and then place it on the shirt and make my printing stroke.
I'm thinking I'm applying either too much or too little pressure on the both the flood stroke and the printing stroke.
Should I get a press? I know it would be easier so I don't have to hold down the frame. When I pull the frame away from the shirt the paint clings to the frame, thus causing there to be an inconsistency of the paint in the transfer (i.e. too much paint).
Without knowing any of the specific things you're doing, I can only guess at the two most common causes. Too much ink: off contact is too high. Too little ink: not doing a flood stroke before printing.
Stupid noob question: What is a flood stroke? Thanks.
A flood stroke is the reinking of the screen after you print to prepare for the next print.
If you are pulling your squeegee to print, then you lift the screen, and push the ink back - that is the flood stroke.
Stupid noob question: What is a flood stroke? Thanks.
this is a basic screen printing technique....doesnt anyone do any reasearch before they try something new......I know before I purchased my press and supplies ..I did alot of research...watched a ton of videos..and read some books.....
maybe try doing some research before hand..might help out with alot of the basic concepts of screen printing.....
a flood stroke.....is when you have the screen off the shirt and pull or push the squeegee over the image area to fill the area with ink....then lay the screen down on te shirt and pull or push the squeegee again to print.
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I've got the same problem!
I'm a newbie and just started out with water-based ink (red and black) to print on white shirts.
I don't have a press and I don't use hinges (so basically I'm holding the frame while I make a printing stroke).
I do a flood stroke before hand and then place it on the shirt and make my printing stroke.
I'm thinking I'm applying either too much or too little pressure on the both the flood stroke and the printing stroke.
Should I get a press? I know it would be easier so I don't have to hold down the frame. When I pull the frame away from the shirt the paint clings to the frame, thus causing there to be an inconsistency of the paint in the transfer (i.e. too much paint).
Help!
you will not get a decent clean print without some off contact...by just laying the screen on the shirt and holding it with one hand and pulling the squeegee with the other..the screen will stick to the shirt..if you have a minimum of 1/16th inch off contact the screen will spring back up after you pull the squeegee over the image thus releasing from the shirt clean.you also will need some spray adhesive to hold the shirt down to a platen or board...hope this helps a bit.
so waterbase ink doesnt make the screen stick to the shirt with no off contact?
The shirt may or may not stick to the screen (does sometimes, doesn't other times). Either way, it is possible to "get a decent clean print" (obviously shirt sticking to screen = bad, but it doesn't automatically mean poor print). A clear stroke can help with that. Printing on a table (as opposed to a carousel) helps if you're using on-contact printing. I've also done it successfully on a carousel though.
There are very few absolutes in screenprinting; anyone saying "It must be done this way." is far more likely to be wrong than right.
In this case, it's not even a matter of best practice vs. technically possible: sometimes printing on-contact has practical advantages over off-contact.
Emulsion creates a gasket, so if you want to think of it that way there's always a certain amount of off-contact
The shirt may or may not stick to the screen (does sometimes, doesn't other times). Either way, it is possible to "get a decent clean print" (obviously shirt sticking to screen = bad, but it doesn't automatically mean poor print). A clear stroke can help with that. Printing on a table (as opposed to a carousel) helps if you're using on-contact printing. I've also done it successfully on a carousel though.
There are very few absolutes in screenprinting; anyone saying "It must be done this way." is far more likely to be wrong than right.
In this case, it's not even a matter of best practice vs. technically possible: sometimes printing on-contact has practical advantages over off-contact.
Emulsion creates a gasket, so if you want to think of it that way there's always a certain amount of off-contact
Along these same lines, I have been thinking of trying discharge with no OC to drive the ink farther in the shirt and getting a deeper discharge. Does this make sense?
Using discharge with OC only affects the top layer, so it looks cracked after washing, which is a good thing sometimes, but not others.
Screen Printing Inking Problem 
