Wednesday, March 12, 2014

Discharge Ink for Garment Printing

Discharge Ink for Garment Printing

We tend to love the results of printing with discharge ink.  This waterbased method is for dark colored clothes and has been around for over 30 years. It has recently cycled back around do to re-creating the planning of vintage t-shirts.  The colours usually don’t retain its vibrancy as regular plastisol printing however the texture is ultra soft and (when done correctly) will last longer than the shirt itself.  Regular screen printing uses plastisol ink, that may be a rubber-based product. Plastisol ink lays a somewhat heavy layer on top of a shirt and normally needs multiple print layers… leaving a thick vinyl sticker-like feel on the shirt.  For example, if you are looking to print white ink on a black shirt, that white ink would want to be printed two times (print, flash, print) in order for it to look bright and smooth. Plastisol ink is nice for printing inside neck size labels because the ink will not bleed through to the opposite aspect of the garment.  Screen printing discharge ink is complicated and needs a heap of experience. Make certain you select the proper screen printer!

How does discharge ink work?

Discharge printing bleaches out the initial color of the garment and replaces it with the new color, or pigment.  This process only works with 100 percent cotton shirts that are dark. Polyester could be a artificial material and does not react to discharge. There is a twelve hour shelf life to discharge ink, what ever isn't used gets trashed!

Thus, let’s say your looking to print on a black t-shirt with white discharge ink.  Seems easy right, not extremely… You initially would like to start with a non-active base solution, then add white pigment, and  then a tiny percentage of activator (aka. agent or parolite) to bring the ink to life.  The shirt itself also needs to be tested as all shirts can react slightly differently. This industry is known for “over-dying”. Over-dying is when a t-shirt manufacturer runs out of black tees and desires to switch them fast. If they have a ton of red tees in stock, they will take that inventory and dye them once more in black to fill stock. That causes huge problems with discharge ink because the white pigment desired turns pink upon testing. The smart t-shirt brands constantly check each new batch of tees to make certain their individuals overseas aren’t over-dying. Most dark colors discharge well, except, kelly green and royal blue coloured t-shirts.

The nice factor is, once the job is setup and running, there is no base needed or flashing of ink, or trapping therefore less product is employed and production time is faster. Discharge ink is eco-friendly!

So as for discharge and water-based mostly ink to cure properly, we have a large 28 foot gas dryer that pumps tons of heat.  At least a pair of minutes of heat time needed.

As a result of this process can be therefore tedious (particularly with multiple ink colors) InkMyTee.com features a a hundred and fifty piece order minimum.

Summary:

Discharge ink…

• is for dark, a hundred p.c cotton tees solely

• bleaches out the dye of the tee and replaces it with the newly mixed color

• is environmentally friendly

• feels ultra soft

• resembles vintage style

• requires experience

• expires once twelve hours

Plastisol ink…

• is rubber based and easy to figure with

• sometimes wants two layers of ink on dark tees

• the colors stay vibrant

• contains a long shelf life

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