A1 sublimation home printer advice

[GC1pink]

Hello everyone

im fairly new to the world of sublimation I'd like to expand into more textiles such as tea towels, aprons and cushions. Could anyone provide some advice on an a1 printer for my home business?

thank you

[Customprintwales]

I would think your biggest issue is not the printer but the heat press.

Heat presses for this sort of size can be difficult to install for home use due to their size and especially weight. You may even need 3 phase electricity supply.

[pw66]

Got to agree with the heat press issue. You will struggle to find anything much larger than A2 in single phase. You might be able to find a calender press that will run on single phase, but they are expensive ( £12k +). Alternatively you might find an electrician who could re-wire a three phase press to single phase on a 60 amp circuit, but you could run into insurance problems, if things go wrong.

Printer wise Epson make a few wide format sublimation printers, such as the 7890 ( about £3k).
Mimaki make a lot of dye sub printers, but not as small as A1. The CJV 150 range starts with the 800mm width CJV 150-75, but they don't officially offer sub ink for anything smaller than the CJV 150-107 (1100mm).

[Justin]

I use the VJ628 printer which prints onto 25" rolls but I guess you'll need something bigger. I looked at a large press, yes you'd need 3 phase and the press will probably be £4k plus. Only reason we didn't buy is it wouldn't come through our doorways without being dismantled!

My honest opinion, as you're new to Sublimation and presumably don't yet have a tried and tested market, contract it all out. Many folk do that. We work partly as a fulfilment company and can provide all of the items you've mentioned. Send me a PM if you'd like to discuss any further.

[GC1pink]

Hello,

Thank you for your replies, it has certainly opened my eyes to potential pitfalls. I think perhaps DTG may well be the way forward for my textiles and keeping my Ricoh for my mugs, coasters etc. I will be spending this evening reading through the forums on DTG.

Many thanks again.

[Customprintwales]

Don't forget that even with DTG printing you will still need a heat press to fix the image. DTG just means you don't need a transfer to carry the image across.

[pw66]

You still need to cure dtg prints - either with a heat press or a conveyor drier.
Either do as Justin suggests and sub out the large format printing or consider a 17"/A2 printer.

Something like an Epson SC-P800 is about £1000. An A2 Pressmech heatpress is about £1300.

[pisquee]

We have a rotary heat press (43" wide) which will run on a single phase 13 amp plug (although the plug's less warm on a 16 amp!)
With that a 44" Epson printer.

So, it is possible - but it wasn't where we started - in the beginning my wife had an A3 home/photo Epson, and cheap chinese clam presses, when we met and I got my head around how things worked I quickly got a better presses and an A2 pro level Epson printer ... over the years, we've traded our equipment up to where we are now. I wouldn't advise jumping in to where are before learning the basics first

[GC1pink]

Thank you all so much for your very kind assistance it's greatly appreciated.