Liquid Laminate for Vehicle Wraps

[stickerhead]

A company out of Chicago hired me to install a wrap on a 24ft box truck. On Saturday, I rec'd the truck & wrap. I was shocked (& highly pissed off) to find the print covered in transfer tape. When I talked to the company about it they said they always used liquid lam & covered their prints with transfer tape. Needless to say this tripled my install time. Anyway, this last weekend was the first time I installed vinyl on a vehicle that had liquid lam. I'm curious to know how well does liquid lam hold up on vehicles? Is it a UV coating? Why is it when I peeled off the transfer tape (in small little strips), all I could smell was ink or maybe the laminate? I read the other thread about liquid lam, but when the question came up for vehicles, it was not answered. Can anyone enlighten me as to why you would use liquid lam on a vehicle wrap? What's the pros & cons?

Any information would be greatly appreciated!

 

[SkyPrintAlex]

I've never gotten a job like that, but a buddy of mine told me early in my career of signage that getting a contracted job for like coca cola is a pain because they always send you the material transfer taped and you have to install it that way. I think it would be a total headache to install. I would normally never ask a question like "will there be transfer tape on the print" but I think next time I will when I get a outside job like that.

I hate liquid laminate, it's a pain. I had some license plates made for a friend years back and they were done with liquid lam, they were all stuck together. It was terrible.

 

[CanuckSigns]

it's done because it's cheaper to produce, these large fleet accounts are all about the $$, if liquid lam saves them $100 per truck, they are all for it.

of course they never tell you about it before you quote the job, and good luck getting them to pay any additional labour due to the extra time taken.

it's a good idea on your quote to put something to the effect of "price quoted is based on supplied graphics being printed on a high quality air egress vinyl with matching film lamination, graphics supplied in any other way will require a new quote"

 

[jfiscus]

Some places do it because it is cheaper to print and spray lam. That is the only reason they do it that way.
These are only for things like box trucks, beverage trailers, semi's, etc though. You can't do an actual "wrap" with that type of vinyl.
Removal is also a lot harder.

 

[mgieske]

I always ask for specifics on materials and laminates being supplied before quoting anything. If they play dumb, just say you need to assume absolute worst case scenario pricing. Unless it truly is garbage they'll usually fork over the information at that point.

 

[Bly]

We just did a removal that was unlammed vinyl laid down then clearcoat sprayed over on the van.

It came off in small pieces. Took days...

 

[DrunknMonk]

I have used liquid laminate, it is alot cheaper, I dont use it anymore, one of the lads cleaned off chinagraph pencil marks with meths the cloth stuck to the laminate the job was trashed

 

[stickerhead]

Thanks for the info. The last jobs I did that had pre-mask on it was 7-up & Bordens back in the early 90's.... That's why I didn't bother asking, I didn't know anybody still continued using premask on prints. I don't understand why someone would laminate with something cheap & then use premask, doubling the labor.... If they step back & looked at that process compared to using roll laminate & one step of labor I would think it would be the same price or a little cheaper..... That might be the problem where people forget to charge for labor part. I want to contact the owners of this company regarding this issue, but I get a feeling it will go in one ear & out the other. I just won't do work for them again.

So a good example from the previous thread about liquid laminate when asked about vehicles, the ones that bragged about how good it was to use they didn't respond if it was good for vehicles, they kept quiet or ignored the question just like this company that didn't tell the full story up front about their wrap.

Thanks! Signs 101 Rocks!

 

[SightLine]

We will sometimes use a low tack digital premask on taller installs to prevent stretching the panels too much, when we do we still try to keep the mask at least an inch form the edges so overlaps are easier to setup without having to pull some masking away first. On taller wraps when you have a 10 foot tall x 50 inch wide piece of vinyl only hanging from the top few inches, the weight of the vinyl is going to stretch is some during install. Granted if all panels stretch about the same amount its no bid deal. I'd never use anything medium or high tack for that though, then it would take a lot longer trying to pull the premask off.

On liquid lam - yeah I've run into that crap more than I'd like over the years. I've seen the premask strip the liquid lam many times too.

 

[Pixels Are Bad Mmmkay?]

I've seen the premask strip the liquid lam many times too.

I have also seen this happen myself.

 

[Grizzly]

it's done because it's cheaper to produce, these large fleet accounts are all about the $$, if liquid lam saves them $100 per truck, they are all for it.

of course they never tell you about it before you quote the job, and good luck getting them to pay any additional labour due to the extra time taken.

it's a good idea on your quote to put something to the effect of "price quoted is based on supplied graphics being printed on a high quality air egress vinyl with matching film lamination, graphics supplied in any other way will require a new quote"

This nails it on the spot. Liquid lamination can be under .10 cents/sqft.

We have a liquid laminator and coat all of our flat stock. Occasionally for temporary, low cost lamination, we'll use it on smaller stickers and won't mask. We've also tried to bid on fleets of semi-truck trailers and usually get booted out because that is what they're putting on, inexpensive liquid laminate. It's also a pain in the but to get off, because over time the laminate will bond to the sticker and then go brittle. Which is why some of you have said it comes off in little tiny pieces and it's a pain.