Need Help Drying on take up roll for Vehicle Wraps

[gabagoo]

and blow debris all over the print?

How dirty is your shop?

 

[ProPDF]

How dirty is your shop?

How clean is yours? You have never laminated a hair I guess.

 

[Pixels Are Bad Mmmkay?]

How clean is yours? You have never laminated a hair I guess.

Hair under the laminate happens regardless of whether or not you put a fan on your print as it's coming off the printer. From my experience, that happens because someone isn't wiping the media with a tack cloth as it feeds into the laminator or before it gets laminate rolled over it. Any hair is most likely going to be so heavy it's not going to stick to a print that's already to the take-up reel. We're not talking about blowing the fan onto wet ink here. We're talking about extra airflow as the print feeds onto the reel to help ensure that the ink won't stick to the backing paper. Solvent ink can be dry to the touch and not attract dust yet still transfer to the backing paper if it's rolled up airtight for longer than several minutes.

Also, I will say I absolutely agree that a dryer before the takeup reel is probably the best solution. We just use a fan on occasion if we're worried about the prints sticking and it works for us because we always wipe our prints before laminating anyway. We're a small shop and this method is perfect for our budget right now and our printer that doesn't run constantly day in and day out. If I were running many yards of continuous material on a daily basis there is absolutely no doubt we would employ an extra dryer.

 

[ikarasu]

Most hair and dust from laminating is due to static...which mostly happens when laminating, not as much as when your printing. It'll grab a hair from a ft away and cling it to the media. Having a fan blowing on the media should not have any effect on dust / hair, unless you have piles of it sitting inetween the 12" your printer and fan is....

9/10 times it's likely too much ink being laid down, I will agree with that. But if your printing on a media that's not supposed.to be printed on and the ink isn't drying enough... A fan will work wonders.

 

[GaSouthpaw]

We run full rolls. A lot of them. We've made a "closet" with a plastic pallet floor (you can get 'em from ULine) and a couple of bathroom exhaust fans at the bottom on the back wall. There are two large vents at the top to allow air in. We put loosely wound rolls- right off the printer- 15 a day, at times (we have five solvent printers) in the room for at least 24 hours- though we shoot for 48. The air coming in from the top (in theory) lets the gasses "flow" down to the floor, thanks to the pallets (which have plenty of open areas to allow the flow), and out the building through the exhaust fans. Overkill for a lot of shops, true.
Point is, the loose rolls allow the gas to migrate down, and them being raised allows the fumes to be evacuated. Since I got the thing built, we haven't had any problems with drying, improper outgassing, or not enough outgassing.

 

[equippaint]

Not to be contrary but what issues did you see before, using the same drying times, that have since disappeared? How do you measure outgassing to actually know if it is doing anything? I'm just having a hard time buying this does anything except offer peace of mind. Most people don't do this and if it was required to prevent issues, the media manufacturers would have put out a bulletin by now because they do anything they can to weasel out of warranty. You also don't see failures all over the place from the majority not doing all of this let alone the people not waiting to laminate.

 

[ikarasu]

Can somebody do me a favor with their solvent. I really want to see a fresh, heavy saturated print laminated immediately, just to see what the failure actually looks like. Is it that burnt brownish pinkish texture that slowly creeps across the print?

It varries. The glue becomes really gummy since all the solvent leaks to the glue.. so if it's for a vehicle wrap it's a pain in the ass.

Because the solvent goes into the glue... It can cause premature failure by peeling / falling off. And in rarer occasions it can cause bubbling through the laminate.

99/100 times none of the above will happen though And the print will be fine. The offgassing rule was mainly for older machines.... The newer ones are greener and don't need as much offgassing time.

 

[gabagoo]

How clean is yours? You have never laminated a hair I guess.

Of course I have laminated many hairs,but they don't get on the print from a fan drying the ink...they come from the laminating process. Peeling 54" of laminate off of backing paper creates incredible static depending on the day...swiffers and tac clothes are needed but for the most part they are few and far between. My printer has drying fans and I just add another one just before it rolls up so the ink at that point is pretty dry unless we are printing double coverage or very high res.

 

[equippaint]

I haven't ever used a solvent, but I have seen a ton of similar failures that I chalk up to outgassing. It almost looks like the vinyl is growing mold between the lam and print.
I'd be really interested what would happen if you ran 3 prints, let first one outgas and laminate it, take the second and laminate it immediately and stick it outside facing the sun, and the third just laminate immediately and leave indoors.

These failures have been posted here from people that use latex as well, looks like a burnt print. Our entrance sign came straight off the printer to the laminator. It's been there 3 maybe 4 years with no burning, peeling etc. Double sided, Florida sun, no shade, cal vinyl. It's anecdotal but its what I can see everyday.
I do see mold growing on signs, saw it on a pretty new flex face this morning too that we didn't make. It is possible that if this is left unchecked that it can begin to stain or somehow embed itself in the material. Our shop truck has mold staining on the hood that doesn't come off. My camper gets it on the white stripes too but not anywhere else and can be a little difficult to remove.

 

[jfiscus]

The number 1 failure we experience with rushed prints that are not given proper time to out-gas is adhesive failure. Yes, it certainly makes the prints harder to install, but that is not a "failure".
If you have a print that bridges a channel like the fake windows on a ford/chevy van that the print covers it will lift out of those channels even if it is properly installed. Once it lifts it cracks/peels/etc and needs replaced. Have a couple customers that demanded rush installs, and then realized the same vans were the only ones with vinyl issues.

 

[GaSouthpaw]

We undergo manufacturer certification yearly. Any time we have an issue, one of the first questions they ask (when the prints are done on the solvent printers) is "did it outgas a minimum of 24 hours?" - followed closely by every other way of blaming it on us and not material they can try, but that's a topic for another thread.
As jfiscus mentioned, adhesive failure is our top problem when prints don't have time to outgas (though I actually do consider that a failure). The material can become almost gummy on the adhesive side, where strings of adhesive come off.
Another problem, related to the adhesive failures, is the installers having trouble getting the prints off the backers, and having trouble installing them. And the installers are trained/certified. If they're having trouble, I know I'm going to have trouble because it's been a few years since I did vinyl installs daily.
Another issue that's not really a failure- but a still very good reason to allow the recommended outgassing- is the smell. Everyone in our shop is used to it- the folks walking past the installed graphics (which are often in enclosed spaces) not so much.
I'm not judging one way or the other- we've all had customers who insisted they couldn't wait, then came back and bitched when something wasn't right even after they were warned that it was going to happen. I'm just saying that our way works for us- and has cut down on problems that we were having in those areas.

 

[ikarasu]

I haven't ever used a solvent, but I have seen a ton of similar failures that I chalk up to outgassing. It almost looks like the vinyl is growing mold between the lam and print.
I'd be really interested what would happen if you ran 3 prints, let first one outgas and laminate it, take the second and laminate it immediately and stick it outside facing the sun, and the third just laminate immediately and leave indoors.

In our 3m vehicle class the teacher pulled out some sandwhich bags filled with vinyl. He had them labeled 0,6,12,24 hours -

He explained he laminated and threw them in the sandwhich bag based on those times. It's an extreme case because the bags are sealed airtight and any solvents have nowhere to go.

The 0 the vinyl was goop.... As in it melted. 6 it was really bad... 12 it was workable, but still seemed pretty bad. The 24 felt normal. I'm not sure what printer they used... And this is the worst case scenario.... IE if someone overlams a full roll and rerolls it tightly, or lays 20 panels ontop of each other so the bottom had no room to breath and completely trapped.the vinyl.

This was 5 years ago... The newer inks are better and may differ. But overlam isn't breathable. So all the solvent gets trapped and only has one way to go...to the glue.

Does it make the glue less effective? Yes... Does it make it so much less effective it'll cause a failure? Doubtful.

One time we wrapped a white vehicle with a freshly printed and lammed print. It was a temp print going up for a month so we didn't worry about of gassing. After a month when we pulled it off.the vehicle... There was a red hue left behind wherever there was red ink it washed away with some effort. But that was the main thing that caused us to wait before laminating. If it sat in the vehicle.for a year.. Who knows if it would have wiped off.

But again... I'm a firm believer in for the most part waiting to overlam doesn't matter, solvent or latex. If it's a job you want to last 10 years.... Waiting a day to put overlam on won't kill you. Better safe than sorry. And on the other hand.... We've done it hundreds of times with very few failures. Sometimes you can wait.... Sometimes you can't.

It.being wound too tight on the take up reel is one thing we never worried about though.

 

[Kentucky Wraps]

LATEX! JK
....but no really....







.LATEX!

 

[Signed Out]

GRAINTEX! JK
....but no really....







.GRAINTEX!

Fixed it for you.

 

[ProPDF]

In our 3m vehicle class the teacher pulled out some sandwhich bags filled with vinyl. He had them labeled 0,6,12,24 hours -

He explained he laminated and threw them in the sandwhich bag based on those times. It's an extreme case because the bags are sealed airtight and any solvents have nowhere to go.

The 0 the vinyl was goop.... As in it melted. 6 it was really bad... 12 it was workable, but still seemed pretty bad. The 24 felt normal. I'm not sure what printer they used... And this is the worst case scenario.... IE if someone overlams a full roll and rerolls it tightly, or lays 20 panels ontop of each other so the bottom had no room to breath and completely trapped.the vinyl.

what a horrific dramatic 3m presentation. My lunch baggies are marked safe from this carnage.

 

[Kentucky Wraps]

Fixed it for you.

Maybe older, smaller Latex printers have issues...but I don't have "grain" issues with the L560. Prints just as nice as my old Versacamm.

 

[greysquirrel]

One ink? Profile and media match? Have you linearized? Is it primarily blacks not drying? What’s the buil of the blanks...any more then 30 30 30 100 and it will never dry