Cheep Chinese Heat Press Vs Quality Branded Heat press

Just thought to share my experience about cheep Chinese eBay press and Stalhs HotTonix press ..
I ve used a cheep Chinese press over 3 years and used every day at least for an 1 hr or 2 for sublimation stuff mainly phone cases .And it was great never let me down (I only paid 120 pounds for this ). But when I tried to print t-shirts on it, it never gave me good results .Sublimation t-shirts come with faded patches , Transfers come out with un-perfect edges but I was not aware why this was happening and never bothered to print Tees any more ...Recently bought a used Hottronix Press ..Wow !! now I can see why ppl always talking about Good Heat press .....It proves Cheep Chinese vs US quality difference ....Now my T-shirts come out perfect every time and sublimation stuff printed even better than before .....!!
So guys if you are starting up ( Not T-shirts ) with a little Capital cheep Chinese (Just 120 pounds ) is great it will do the job leave you some money to buy stocks , so you can start making some money with a very small Capital .. When you are ready go for a quality press even a used one would do .....

I think we got our big INSTA swing away heat press in about 1984 or 1988. It has done many thousands of T-shirts over the years and I think the only problems have been a few blown fuses. And the built in thermometer is faulty but the thermostat is fine. The clockwork timer dies sometimes for times over 50 seconds so it is close enough on Sublimation but I just use two digital kitchen timers these days. One for Sub and one for heat Transfer.

On the other hand, I use a cheap Chinese press for all stuff smaller than A3, and it has been bulletproof for about 3 or 4 years except that it took ages to get a feel for the pressures and to work out just how wrong the thermostat is.

As I'm now re-tyred I will probably replace the INSTA with a Chinese A3+ swing away. But I know it won;t be as good as the INSTA quality.

Pros with the INSTA include consistency and steady temp once it is hot. Cons are mostly that it wastes a hell of a lot of electricity just heating if doing short runs.

I use a cheap chinese press bought off ebay. I had a very limited budget but wanted to expand my clothing store and look into other ways of bringing in revenue. Although i have not had my machine for aslong as others it has been solid and does the job i need it to do ( printing logos on tees for local businesses and hen parties etc) i did find that alot of trial and error went into working out the pressure for vinyls, transfer papers etc. I also bought a handheld laser thermometer to check the heat on the platen. All four corners and centre are pretty much the same +/- 3-4 degrees. Im happy with mine but i havent really worked it to hard.

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Originally Posted by rossdv8

I think we got our big INSTA swing away heat press in about 1984 or 1988. It has done many thousands of T-shirts over the years and I think the only problems have been a few blown fuses. And the built in thermometer is faulty but the thermostat is fine. The clockwork timer dies sometimes for times over 50 seconds so it is close enough on Sublimation but I just use two digital kitchen timers these days. One for Sub and one for heat Transfer.

On the other hand, I use a cheap Chinese press for all stuff smaller than A3, and it has been bulletproof for about 3 or 4 years except that it took ages to get a feel for the pressures and to work out just how wrong the thermostat is.

As I'm now re-tyred I will probably replace the INSTA with a Chinese A3+ swing away. But I know it won;t be as good as the INSTA quality.

Pros with the INSTA include consistency and steady temp once it is hot. Cons are mostly that it wastes a hell of a lot of electricity just heating if doing short runs.

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..Chinese do the job but the difference is like Merc Vs Scoda lol....

I was like you ..But when I got the new Stahls machine I can see what these ppl are talking about good presses ..Before that I was like why u pay extra £££ for something when you can use a £100 press ..But now I knw the difference .....Save up a bit and buy a Used One (check on ebay for good deals but u need to wait )..

I should add that for my mug presses the cheap Chinese one walks all over the expensive one for persistent image quality. Pert of that is because I normally use my old press to pre heat mugs. But even without pre heating the old one was about240 seconds press time on ceramic, and had fading at the base and near the handle. The cheap one is about 120 seconds and doesn't have fading anywhere even without preheating.

And the image detail pressing on the Chinese one is so much sharper than the current model of a well known brand a friend uses. However I think some of that is technique. He's been doing mugs far longer than I and does them the 'right way'.

I would lay odds that the expensive one these days is designed much better, and would produce great results. But I'm going to continue pre-heating with my old clunker and pressing in the cheapo.

My mug press (chinese) has also been spot on, every time I've used it and produces a great end product.