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laminate width

JAMESGANGRACING

JAMESGANGRACING

New Member
how does every one deal with the laminate being a little wider than the print media? It seems that laminate is always a little wider than the print media and it sticks to the rollers . At least oracal is that way. 54" 210 measures 54 1/4 sometimes.
 
petesign

petesign

New Member
I took the deck off of the back of my laminator. Never have problems with laminate sticking to rollers... but the rear metal deck was god awful.
 
JAMESGANGRACING

JAMESGANGRACING

New Member
I just always wondered why they dont cut the laminate an 1/8 or 1/4" shorter than the print media, seems like that would make life simpler as you cant print on the entire width of the print media.
 
C

cgsigns_jamie

New Member
Blue Painters Tape... (that's my trade secret) .. Laminate won't stick to it.

I lined the rear deck of my laminator with blue painters tape. I also have a 57" x 8" x .080" lexan panel lined in blue painters tape too... I use that to push the film through the rollers when I load the laminator.
 
Malkin

Malkin

New Member
My 54" laminate is usually about 1/8" wider than the printed vinyl, but it never sticks... even when its so crooked that that vinyl shifts to allow a whole inch of laminate to be exposed. Maybe it just depends on the machine?
 
D

Donny7833

New Member
The reason I buy Oracal is because they have matching width laminates. Other companies sell 38" lam for 36" print stock. That's a true pain in the butt. I've noticed that the Oracal lam can float a little from batch to batch. I'll get a 54 that exactly the same size as the vinyl, the next one could be slightly wider or shorter. If it's wider I try to split the difference and remove the rear table from the laminator, works pretty good going roll to roll. You could use a chop saw to shave a quarter inch off of one edge. I do that on occasion when needed, works like a charm.
 
CheapVehicleWrap

CheapVehicleWrap

New Member
JAMESGANGRACING said:
I just always wondered why they dont cut the laminate an 1/8 or 1/4" shorter than the print media, seems like that would make life simpler as you cant print on the entire width of the print media.
Click to expand...


Beacuse that would require common sense. I've wondered this for a long time. I don't stick to the rollers I stick at the take up which suks.
 
MikePro

MikePro

New Member
even if you're laminate is smaller than your material, you'll eventually run into issues where a little bit creeps over the edge... and its a HUGE pain when you don't notice in time and your laminated product wraps around the rollers.
therefore, on long runs, i give my laminator a "reach-around", and flip the laminated product over the top of the laminate roll and tuck it into the take-up roller of the liner so it never has a chance to drag across the backplate of the laminator.

can post pics if you like :ROFLMAO:
 
Edserv

Edserv

New Member
This may sound really crazy, but for the last 2 years, we dismantled our GBC and manually size and place our 3M or vinyl with no more than 2 inches of laminate on each side. For the additional labor and time it takes to do this, we have experienced an almost 100% success ratio for laminating with zero bubbles, wrinkles or mistakes. We don't use any butcher paper or wax paper- we simply size the laminate, aim the vinyl (as close as possible) and press "start" (usually at a 1 or 2 setting.) Once the GBC takes, we increase the setting to 7 or 8 and it rips right through.
For car wraps or delicate media, we are careful to make sure we have an extremely clean environment and almost never have any problems.
The only (rare) times we have mistakes is if we're under a deadline and hurrying. Haste makes waste. It really does.
Aloha,
Edserv
 
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