Emulsion vs. Capillary Film
As a screen printer, you make screens on a regular basis. For your stencil making, we’d like to know if you coat your screens with emulsion, capillary film, or use both on a regular basis.
Home » “How To” Articles
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How to Create a Halftone Image for Screen Printing–Fast, Easy and Free
Creating a halftone image for screen printing is easy if you have the right program. The halftone conversion that we will do in this tutorial will produce a halftone image of approximately 35 lines per inch. 35 l.p.i. dots are fairly large. However, these “big dots” produce an image that is an easy to print film positive and an easy to expose screen.
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What’s the Best Type of Light for an Exposure Unit?
Many people want to build their own exposure unit for screen printing and the key component of any exposure unit is the light source. So the question always comes up, what kind of light should I use in my exposure unit?
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Halftone Printing
To be able to screen print photographic or grayscale images, an image must be converted into what is known as “halftones”. A halftone image consists of many small dots that make up the grayscale portion of that image. Screen printing halftones can present certain challenges.
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Curing a Screen Print
The last step in the screen printing process is the curing of the print. Plastisol ink must reach a temperature of 320 degrees to be considered “fully cured.” Although it would seem natural to use the term “dryed,” it would be a misnomer as the ink film on a product may feel “dry” to the touch, but not be fully cured throughout the entire ink deposit. The print surface may seem “dry,” but the inner portion of the ink film may not be.
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How to Build an Exposure Unit
The “home-made” units covered in this chapter range in cost from under $100 (fluorescent tube or halogen bulb unit) to around $300 for a metal-halide unit.
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Buying Used Screen Printing Equipment–Smart or Foolish?
When it comes to buying used equipment, if you are an experienced screen printer and have purchased new equipment over the years, you will definitely have an advantage over someone who has never printed before.
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Using Off Contact in Screen Printing
Once the squeegee is pulled across the mesh, off-contact immediately lifts the screen mesh away from the substrate as the squeegee is moved the across the stencil, resulting in a good print. If you have a press with an “off-contact” adjustment, it is a simple matter to set it precisely at the height that you want. Just turn the knob and watch the screen raise or lower. You can “feel” the amount of off-contact by pressing down on the mesh.
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How to Build a Screen Hold-Down for an Exposure Unit
If you have built your own exposure unit, you have most likely discovered that holding a screen firmly against the glass and the film positive during the exposure process can be a problem. Each screen burning session often becomes a trial and error process that produces inconsistent results. What you need is
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Screen Printing on Sweatshirts & Sweatpants
Printing on sweats can be very profitable but require different printing techniques. There are a few things to watch out for when printing sweatshirts or sweatpants. First, you will need to use more platen adhesive than usual to hold the garment in place
