We've printed foil prints before using waterbased inks for other colors, and using foil adhesive for the foil parts on a manual press. But we have an automatic press now and we have a 500 piece order, black waterbased ink with foil front, and the same for the back. I want to gel the adhesive enough to stack the shirts on top of each other so that we can foil them all at once after the printing. I've seen it done before, but whenever I run the shirt in the dryer and turn the temp to about 200 degrees, the adhesive is too dry for the foil to adhere but then if it's not hot enough, I can't stack the shirts on top of each other. Make sense?
What is the perfect temp for adhesive to gel so that it doesn't smear on other shirts, but tacky enough to foil well?
200 degrees is about right, my guess is the auto is laying a lot less ink then manually printing. I would do a 60 or less screen with a triple coat of emulsion, drying between layers to get a thicker lay down. You may also need to back off on your pressure and angle your squeegees a little more.
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200 degrees is about right, my guess is the auto is laying a lot less ink then manually printing. I would do a 60 or less screen with a triple coat of emulsion, drying between layers to get a thicker lay down. You may also need to back off on your pressure and angle your squeegees a little more.
I'll give that a try. Thanks!
Does anyone have any suggestions for curing the waterbased ink after foiling? I know that the heat press should cure the ink while foiling, but the heatpress won't cover the entire design, so I have to run it through the dryer for a final cure (however doing this makes the foil textured like aged foil?).
We do foil and waterbase all the time on our auto. I use a 110 mesh with a 1-2 coating. Union foil adhesive with a 70 duro squeegee, slow speed and big angle. 2 hits with no flash. We cure at 190 celcius for 80 to 90 seconds, stack and then foil.
For the foiling we use medium to high pressure for 15 seconds at 350 F. Then a light press with a rolled up tee over the whole design and cool completly. After we peel all the foil we run our shirts back through the dryer at highest possible spped to set. This tarneshes the foil a bit but makes it last much longer.
Foil on an Automatic 
