Esrimating ink cost for quote

[LRC]

Hi all.

I was wonding how to determine how much ink would be used on a given design in order to provide someone with a quote.

Any other info regarding ink monitoring wpuld be mich appreciated.

Thanks.

[Quinsfan]

My understanding is that the ink is minimal per print even using SG inks. I mean pence not pounds.


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[pisquee]

It depends on the size of the print - if you're printing on a 44" paper roll by the metre, those pennies soon add up!
For costing purposes, I currently work on £2 per square metre to cover paper and ink, which is over the actual amounts, but helps go towards the cost of running the printer, wastage etc

[webtrekker]

The only way you can estimate this for a given design and size of print is to accurately weigh your cartridges before and after printing. Preferably, do more tha one print (they can all be on the same sheet as you're only testing the ink output) and divide the resulting weight differences by the amount of prints.

[LRC]

Thanks guy. Yeah i thought about measuring the weight, that thats not possible if i want to give a qupte upfront befpre any production. If i had some way of measuring the area of the image I can get it pretty spot on but I havent figured out how to do that on my pc.

[daviddeer]

Try using the ink cost calculator all you have to do then is check the ink levels before and after a job. There is no real way to measure the ink used in ml unless you have a wide format printer which will tell you exactly. So most of your calculations will be subjective.
Old topic about this here
Also this page has a pdf which gives actual print costs for the virtuoso (amongst other useful stuff ) click on the cost per copy data link for the pdf.
also lists
Free Sublimation Catalogue
Free 24 page sublimation catalogue. Download your copy today!
Data Sheet Sublimation Sample Times
A times and temperature guide for the heat pressing of Mega sublimation materials
Cost per copy data for the Virtuoso SG400 and SG800
MSDS SubliJet-R Sublimation Inks
A material safety data sheet (MSDS) for SubliJet-R inks used in the Ricoh printer
Advice on choosing a Heat Press
How to Sublimate a Mug
SG 3110DN error 28212
Sublimation Printing a complete overview by Sawgrass Europe 2012 edition
CreativeStudio Demo download direct from the Sawgrass website
Download Powerdriver or ICC Profiles from Sawgrass website
Inserted an ordinary Ricoh ink cartridge in error in your sublimation printer?
Here's how to clear the ink out - Click here for instructions and file download

[strandville]

I personally see ink costs as negligible when costing I try to work on the basis of small gain in terms of what I feel the product is worth, this so far has worked to my benefit.

[logobear]

just ignore ink cost ..
.. it might be a few pence, or a few few pence......
factor ..... how much you want the job.
how much work/time you want to do ......and how much work/time you have available .....
AND
most importantly .... how much the client will pay!

Its a different answer every time!

[jord]

I've just been working out a minimal cost for materials per item/job for silk screen printing. I don't know either how much ink would be used per design so I've worked on what i brought. I got 5kg of plastisol for £32 I divided the price by 5, 1kg = £6.40 and then divided by 10, 100g =£0.64 of ink per item. I probably won't use that much, BUT on some jobs you will use more, some less. If you know the design is massive you can bump it up. Another way would be to weigh the ink tub, do a sample, scrape off excess ink back into the tub and weigh the tub, you would know how much you have used and could work out from the cost of your ink. If your using dtg then i don't know how to calculate as I haven't got a clue how that all works. Its a start and gives you an idea of useage.

Jord

[karlmugman]

Never work out ink costs - i mean it's so negligible unless you are doing more than 50% coverage.

You're more likely to spend more money on the electrictiy for your heat presses than anything else.