Need Help How to line a roll of mesh for printing?

[Dukenukem117]

I need to print on a mesh material that does not have a liner. What type of service or vendor am I looking for who can apply a liner? The handful of prints I've contracted out were lined manually, which made it too expensive. I need a service that can line an entire 100' roll of this material for feeding into a roll-to-roll printer.

 

[SignMeUpGraphics]

Can you elaborate on why you need to print on bare mesh, then line it afterwards?
I can't see the use case for this.

 

[unclebun]

Can you elaborate on why you need to print on bare mesh, then line it afterwards?
I can't see the use case for this.

The liner needs to be applied before printing so he doesn't ink up his printer.

 

[flyplainsdrifta]

either you need a printer with a setup to accommodate ink overspray and blow thru, like one of the newer hp latex machines, or bite the bullet and get pre lined mesh. I've never heard of someone only applying backer to existing mesh, especially if it is not their own product. sorry man

 

[Solventinkjet]

I've always used the pre-lined mesh but could you possibly tape down some butcher paper to the platen of the printer and run it like that and then just throw the paper out at the end?

 

[Joe House]

I've always used the pre-lined mesh but could you possibly tape down some butcher paper to the platen of the printer and run it like that and then just throw the paper out at the end?

I'm usually agreeing with you VanderJ, but this seems like it would just make a mess on the back of the mesh which would just get dragged forward on the printer and make a bigger mess.

 

[AKwrapguy]

I need to print on a mesh material that does not have a liner. What type of service or vendor am I looking for who can apply a liner? The handful of prints I've contracted out were lined manually, which made it too expensive. I need a service that can line an entire 100' roll of this material for feeding into a roll-to-roll printer.

So I would probably get stuff that already has a liner in it. As far as manually doing it..... In theory if your were able to take some thin, lo-tack temp vinyl you could use a laminator to apply it to the back and than roll it back onto a tube and send through the machine. This would increase the material thickness so you would have to accommodate for that. Heat would also be an issue as the vinyl might get to warm and stick to the printer. No idea what issues the ink would cause on the adhesive, but I'm sure it wouldn't be awesome. There would probably be some other unforeseen issues as well depending on your setup.

You might want to reach out to a manufacture that already creates backed mesh banner and see if they will sell you just the backing. This would be your best bet if you have to do it this way.

Depending on the job it might just be better to outsource it till you can figure it out.

 

[Dukenukem117]

either you need a printer with a setup to accommodate ink overspray and blow thru, like one of the newer hp latex machines, or bite the bullet and get pre lined mesh. I've never heard of someone only applying backer to existing mesh, especially if it is not their own product. sorry man

We need to print on a very specific mesh that doesn't come pre-lined unfortunately as it wasn't originally made for printing. But we are introducing a new product (we are not a printing company) that requires this particular mesh, and it does print well so long as you can overcome the mesh issue.

So I would probably get stuff that already has a liner in it. As far as manually doing it..... In theory if your were able to take some thin, lo-tack temp vinyl you could use a laminator to apply it to the back and than roll it back onto a tube and send through the machine. This would increase the material thickness so you would have to accommodate for that. Heat would also be an issue as the vinyl might get to warm and stick to the printer. No idea what issues the ink would cause on the adhesive, but I'm sure it wouldn't be awesome. There would probably be some other unforeseen issues as well depending on your setup.

You might want to reach out to a manufacture that already creates backed mesh banner and see if they will sell you just the backing. This would be your best bet if you have to do it this way.

Depending on the job it might just be better to outsource it till you can figure it out.

We thought about lining it ourselves with kraft paper, but I was hoping there were readily available professional services that offered this.

 

[bannertime]

I think if I had to do this. I'd probably use a laminator and some type of tacky paper for the lining. Treat it like any other lamination process.

 

[GAC05]

I think if I had to do this. I'd probably use a laminator and some type of tacky paper for the lining. Treat it like any other lamination process.

Maybe get away with some medium tack premask as a liner - shouldn't be too hard to set with a laminator.

 

[Dukenukem117]

Maybe get away with some medium tack premask as a liner - shouldn't be too hard to set with a laminator.

I'm looking at the Aplitapes from RTAPE for this purpose. When I think laminator, I think the plastic envelope that you use to encase copy paper for cheat sheets and study guides. Is that what you are referring to?

 

[SignMeUpGraphics]

Wow, if that's what you're thinking of when talking about industrial printing you should reconsider this project...