Double sided decal without white ink.

[chartle]

I've been asked to print a double sided decal. You know so when its stuck to glass you can read it from both sides.

On my Roland I came up with a setup where I printed it on clear reversed, applied white 651, applied ink jet material 3551 or something similar, printed again right side up,then added laminate and then contour cut.

Tried this on my new Mimaki and I can't figure out how to reprint on the white. It has that nice Origin LED mark but not sure what it lines up with.

Or is there an easier way or should I just tell them I can't do it?

Its a lot of hand work and they need 1,400 4" decals sooner rather than later.

 

[Zendavor Signs]

That is way too much work. Try Indy Imaging (indyimaging.com).

 

[chartle]

Thanks for the replies I was hoping for some tip I was missing but wasn't expecting anything.

But this isn't something I would sub out due to what kind of shop we have here.

I work for a transportation company. We do all our decaling in house.

5 or so years ago we were bought by a much larger global company. The higher ups saw what we had been doing and decided to set us up with larger equipment in a larger space so I can start to make decals for other divisions. I don't really sell my work, its more of an accounting thing. So its just easier for me to have them use whoever they used before.

Its just not worth it for me to have to deal with an outside company that we would have to pay real money to.

I think it's the number, 1,400 is a lot of work. Not sure even how much to "Charge" them.

 

[MikePro]

just use your noodle. not that difficult...

one-offs:
-reverse-print on clear, regular print on white (must have white adhesive-side!).
-laminate the white print
-then use a light table or a sunny window to align white over clear, tape-hinge in place, then use laminator or a squeegee to apply one to the other.
-trim afterwards by hand... i'll usually only do this for simple shapes, for this reason.

large quantities:
same as above but setting up both prints as contour cuts, with same spacing/arrangement, and only printing as many as you can fit on a 4'x4' sheet at a time. too long a run, and its a pita to keep your prints aligned while bonding together.

trouble with this, however, if the logo/image isn't symmetrical... it looks obnoxious when light transluces the decal in the slightest. to which I offer to simply apply grey-backed decals back2back on the glass.

 

[Snydo]

As others have said, sub it out, order it online whatever, if your not set up to do it, it will be far more expensive 'in-house'.

 

[SightLine]

The way we do double sided banners on our Mimaki is to manually make origin marks with a pen. I do not use the red led pointer origin mark because once you move it inward over the platen you are stuck with a slightly smaller print width plus even if you made a pencil mark where you set it that is on the other side of the machine once you flip the roll over....

First of all you need to make sure you are printing dead center on the roll. If for example the job I'm going to print is 48.25 inches wide and I'm printing on 54" material then I know I need it to print exactly 2.875" from the edge of the material (54-48.25/2). We use Flexi and one thing it does dead on with outr JV33 is give an accurate left to right positioning. I can poll the printer for the media width, then subtract the print job width, divide by two, and confidently set the print to be that distance from the edge. The other option would be to make a simple 1/8" black rectangle the width of the print and send that, measure from left to right, adjust and send it again to get it is the exact center of the media.

Then its easy - advance the material an inch or so on the printer using the up/down arrows on the printers keypad, before you hit enter make a small mark with a pen at some known point over the platen like right where the opening for the black strip is on both left and right sides and also flip the edge up and make the mark on the back side as well then hit enter and put it in remote for printing. Then when you are ready to print the second side load the material flipped over (making sure it is well centered and loaded straight) then advance the marks you made to the same spot and hit enter and put it in remote (ready to print). Send the second side making sure it will be run at the same distance from the edge.

Sounds complicated but its actually very simple and quick once you get the hang of it.

 

[J Hill Designs]

Great explanation...

It wont work for double sided decals however

The way we do double sided banners on our Mimaki is to manually make origin marks with a pen. I do not use the red led pointer origin mark because once you move it inward over the platen you are stuck with a slightly smaller print width plus even if you made a pencil mark where you set it that is on the other side of the machine once you flip the roll over....

First of all you need to make sure you are printing dead center on the roll. If for example the job I'm going to print is 48.25 inches wide and I'm printing on 54" material then I know I need it to print exactly 2.875" from the edge of the material (54-48.25/2). We use Flexi and one thing it does dead on with outr JV33 is give an accurate left to right positioning. I can poll the printer for the media width, then subtract the print job width, divide by two, and confidently set the print to be that distance from the edge. The other option would be to make a simple 1/8" black rectangle the width of the print and send that, measure from left to right, adjust and send it again to get it is the exact center of the media.

Then its easy - advance the material an inch or so on the printer using the up/down arrows on the printers keypad, before you hit enter make a small mark with a pen at some known point over the platen like right where the opening for the black strip is on both left and right sides and also flip the edge up and make the mark on the back side as well then hit enter and put it in remote for printing. Then when you are ready to print the second side load the material flipped over (making sure it is well centered and loaded straight) then advance the marks you made to the same spot and hit enter and put it in remote (ready to print). Send the second side making sure it will be run at the same distance from the edge.

Sounds complicated but its actually very simple and quick once you get the hang of it.