Dye Sublimation Printing Vs Screen Printing What Is The Difference?

Query: What is the distinction in between dye sublimation and screen printing?

Answer: The two styles of printing are markedly additional reading diverse. The similarities are that both are printed on substrates and each make an image. Apart from that? Not so much.

The screen-printing process makes use of a very labor intensive set up which you do not have with dye sublimation printing.

I'll walk you via the screen printing approach as I know it quite intimately, because this can be exactly where I started my profession inside the graphics small business.

Central towards the screen printing course of action is definitely the screen (duh, proper?). The screen is still normally referred to as a silkscreen, though silk has not been employed for a lot of decades because the advent of nylon thread.

There are several sorts of screen mesh, beginning at about 100 threads per square inch and going up to several hundred threads per square inch. The much more coarse mesh is becoming less prevalent as it is made use of with oil-based enamel inks which have already been replaced, by and large, with UV inks, which we run via a 220 mesh count because the ink particulates are much smaller than using the older solvent inks.

The screen mesh is usually stretched and glued to a wood or aluminum frame, or attached to expandable frames or roller frames. When stretching the mesh more than a frame, we normally take the pounds per square inch (as shown on a "Newton Meter) as much as 25 or 26, and let the fabric stretch out over-night.

By the time 16 to 24 hours have passed, the meter will show that the tension has dropped off to around 15 pounds per square inch, and we repeat the approach, and also the screens really should have regarding the correct tension at about 20-22 lbs. per square inch tension, creating a taut screen that will deliver a superb, clean print.

When the screen is tensioned and attached to a frame, we ordinarily use a fabric tape to tape around the edges on the frame, both inside and out. This is a semi-permanent option to getting ink leak out about the edges of the emulsion.

Now the screen is prepared for the photo sensitive emulsion, which can be applied with a scoop coater, a variable length tray that emulsion is poured into. Following applying the emulsion for the screen, we move the screen to a flat, curtained drying/storage cabinet, where it dries. Diverse systems of coated screen storage will dry the coated screens at different prices, but ours are often prepared to expose within a few hours unless we put a fan on them.

After the emulsion-coated screens are dry, we are able to now location the film on the print side of the screen, in reverse, tape it in spot, and move it to a vacuum frame. The vacuum frame includes a significant piece of glass upon which the screen is placed, print side against the glass. A "blanket" is placed more than the screen frame, and a vacuum motor engaged, and also the screen is pressed tight against the glass.

The vacuum frame is now rotated to face an exposure light, that is usually on a timer. The light is turned on, as well as the photo sensitive emulsion is exposed, however the areas which can be behind the film good stay susceptible to water. Immediately after the set volume of time, commonly 6 to 10 minutes, the light will turn off, plus the vacuum frame rotated back to laying flat, the pressure released, and the screen removed and moved to a washout tank.

There are actually semi-automated washout tanks which, once you place the screen into it, it is going to expose the image with water inside a short amount of time. At this point we enable the screen to dry, and we're prepared to spot it on the screen printing press.

Following generating certain you will discover no pin holes (if you'll find, we use a blockout emulsion to fill them in), we tape the edges to make sure ink will not leak out around the edges with the print (extra of an issue on a clamshell press than one particular that lifts up and down, leaving the screen flat at all times). We line up the substrate, put in blockers, micro-adjust the screen towards the substrate, and we're ready to print.