mugs for sublimation have a polyester coating that makes them receptive to the transfer. Your glass would need a similar coating.

An additional issue is that the inks are translucent, and there is no white. Your art would have to account for the lack of a white background.

 

mugs for sublimation have a polyester coating that makes them receptive to the transfer. Your glass would need a similar coating.

An additional issue is that the inks are translucent, and there is no white. Your art would have to account for the lack of a white background.

The design is simple and I will only use black ink just to do font letters. Would this suffice knowing that I don't have a white surface?

Thanks for your help

 

You might want to look into a Pad printer.

 

no coating = no sublimating

+2 for pad printing, or screen printing

 

Joto has introduced several laser heat transfer for hard surface. It will be interesting to see how durable they are especially for mugs or glass when subjected to dish washer hot water.

Here is the anouncement.

"JOTO of Blaine, WA, has
introduced new hard surface
transfer papers as an alternative
to sublimation. You simply print
with your color laser printer and
heat press on to blank hard
surface substrates. No special
toner or polyester coating is
needed. CL Hard Surface 1
works on ceramics, metal, and
stainless steel, while CL Hard
Surface 2 works on leather
and wood. CL Crystal works
on glass."

I suppose if your mug press will accomodate for glass bottle with good surface contact and not breaking the glass due to heat or pressure the press will work. You might want to call Joto and get some sample.

 

I talked with Joto at the ISS show (Long Beach) and they indicated that this paper still needs to use "special sublimation blanks". So essentially this is the same as sublimation but you use a color laser printer instead of a sublimation printer.

In other words, you still need to use the hard coated sublimation coated mugs or glasses (not regular mugs or glasses). I buy my sublimation blanks (mugs and water bottles) from Conde. They have good prices and have a West Coast warehouse.

 

Yes ask for crystal or whatever Joto offers. if you are going to press on glass as indicated in the anouncement it seems Crystal is what will do the job.

 

Sorry Lnfortun, didn't actually see your post until now.

Here is an explanation of the hard surface Papers:

CL Hard Surface I is for smooth hard surfaces. You print mirror image. Place substrate on press with printable side face up. Then place printed transfer with printed image face down. Once pressed, peel off transfer paper and only toner will be left.

In the case of crystal, it will vary. If doing a glass mug, it is basically the same application method as sublimation but with different temperatures and higher pressure.

If doing a glass or Crystal plaque with Hard Surface I, it could be on the front or the back of the substrate. If on the front it will have to be mirror imaged. If on the back, it will be printed right reading. Again hard surface on Crystal will create a transparency effect. Most awards shops like to image on the back of the crystal to make the image more durable.

As for the Crystal, there is no backing to peel off (absolutely no peeling is required). Basically you are heat pressing the entire transfer paper to the crystal then trimming the excess paper on the edges off. The printable side is also the adhesive side. And you are printing only on to the back of the crystal. Any areas on the crystal where there is no toner will be white. Once pressed you will trim any excess transfer paper off the edges of the crystal.

Hope this helps.