Hi, last year i bought a craft plotter and a heat press and now i just have to try sublimation as well and in the last weeks i watched thousand youtube videos and articles about it. The important thing is i just want to sublimate for myself, "just for fun" and because i have a heat press anyway. The Sawgrass SG400 would be a nice machine because its plug and play without the hassle of ICC profile which is needed with other brands as far as i know but one color is like 60 Euro! So for a Set of 4 i have to pay over 200 Euro just for fun use and the shelf life of the ink is only one year, that dosnt make much sense in my mind because i wouldnt waste that ink in a year. The positive thing about the sawgrass is that it has vibrant colors and deep blacks and that is exactly what i want, i dont want dull results, i would rather skip the whole thoughts about sublimation if the end results were dull and blurred prints.
The next solution would be to buy an epson printer but as far as i know the print heads of those machines are not really suited to sublimation, well they are suited because of piezo technic but not really suited because the resolution of these printers is to high which results in clogging issues. On the other hand this solution is so cheap, you could print everyday to prevent this and its still cheaper than the sawgrass. An important point is those macines need ICC profiles and my plotter software is from silhouette and it does not support ICC profiles. I could print as a pdf file and open that in a software that supports ICC, that would be a solution but you have to buy it first and you have to study how that works. Which lead me to the solution, there is a company in the US called "Cobra ink" which sells sublimation ink for the standard Epson driver, you dont need an ICC profile at all. Would that make sense?
So for me as a beginner whats the best thing to do? Buy a sawgrass SG-400 because they are currently offered to a good price witout ink and go for aftermarket Inks? Buy a similar Ricoh printer with aftermarket inks? Buy a Epson Eco tank printer with aftermarket ink + ICC profile? Buy the Epson with cobra ink from the US? Buy a cheap 60 Euro Epson and aftermarket inks?
To the inks, which ink is simialr to the sawgrass SG-400 Subli Jet ink in quality or is there an Epson printer and aftermarket ink that is similar to the SG-400? I mean vibrant colors and deep blacks etc..? What is the best ink in europe available, there are some inks available in germany like sublisplash and Subliselect Premium or even original Epson Ultra Chrome DS and others.
Another problem i see with the Epson Ecotank printer is that once the ink is inside you can not get it out anymore, what if the ink gets to old and its still in there? With a normal printer i can just throw away the cartridge but with the Ecotank System?
I would like to pess some Mugs, press on polyester and also sublimate on printable HTV