Long jobs and no take-up

[Thule Skilte]

Being new to the sign business, I have a printer but no take-up system (yet).
If I just let the vinyl drop to the floor it goes print against print which makes it stick to eachother as it had very little time to cure at that point.

With little space and no take-up reel, how do you guys handle long jobs?

 

[2B]

there are PLENTY of DIY ways to get the take up reel taken care of

http://www.signs101.com/forums/showthread.php?110384-Low-Cost-Take-Up-Reels&highlight=take+reel

 

[Thule Skilte]

there are PLENTY of DIY ways to get the take up reel taken care of

http://www.signs101.com/forums/showthread.php?110384-Low-Cost-Take-Up-Reels&highlight=take+reel

And they all are way out of bounds for me at the moment. I'm sure many other newstarters have run into the same issue. Not asking for the impossible (unattended), just how other in the same boat, manage it. I'm fine with attending the print once in a while but almost constantly, is a bit much.

 

[SightLine]

Either babysit the machine while it is printing or buy a takeup. The amount of time, materials, trial and error to fabricate one is hardly worth the few hundred bucks it costs to just buy one.

I guess there are other options. Place your printer on the roof near the edge. This way your only limit to length before it hits the ground is how high you can get the machine.
Pay someone minimum wage to sit there and babysit the machine.
Give your customer a discount if they will sit there and babysit the machine.

 

[Gene@mpls]

Check my setup in the second post on the thread that 2B posted. I had it without a motor for months- set a timer every 10 min or so and manually wind it up.
The time will depend on the speed of your printer and how far it is off the floor. It is made from a closet rod and pvc plumbing fittings- low tech. Gene

 

[GAC05]

Take one of shipping tubes for banner rolls & cut it in half
Cut A "V" shaped notch in each one.
Line them up in front of the printer
Stick an empty core on a piece of pipe or conduit
Set the pipe in the notches.
Roll the prints just enough to keep them off the floor

The 1304 I have isn't designed to hold a 80 or 90 pound roll of banner so I use the factory take up to feed the material to the printer & the DYI reel to wind up the finished prints.


wayne k
guam usa

 

[sfr table hockey]

This is the link to the one I made a couple years back. (I guess its been 4 years ago...... where did the time go.....)
http://www.signs101.com/forums/show...el-20-or-less&highlight=home made takeup reel

Only change I have made was added the extra 5 lbs so now it's 15 lbs. The biggest thing you would need is the large tube ( like GAC05 ) suggested that you would get with some of the HD banner rolls. I still just tape the leader onto the media I am printing and let it roll from there.

The most I have rolled on it was about 30 feet of a 54" 13 oz banner material at one time. After that the weights (15 lbs) are just able to roll the reel. There is very little pull on the leader so the printer is actually able to do a cut and re roll and back up etc. with the media feeding back and forth. I seldom have cut such a large job where I use that but it does work as well.

 

[Phil Swanson]

I have a 5' piece of plywood with an eyelet in the center. I strap the plywood to the frame under the printer thru the eyelet and make a ramp for the vinyl to slide down. I can print about 6 to 8 feet without it folding. you also need to add a dry time if your going to do a countour cut. You do have to watch once in a while to make sure its sliding ok.

 

[jrsc]

If all you need is to keep it from bunching up and ink touching ink just roll the stuff yourself as it comes off. When it hits the floor start rolling. come back every couple minutes and roll a little more and leave the roll sitting on the floor. We do it all the time when we are just printing one small banner and don't want to bother with the take up real.

 

[Thule Skilte]

If all you need is to keep it from bunching up and ink touching ink just roll the stuff yourself as it comes off. When it hits the floor start rolling. come back every couple minutes and roll a little more and leave the roll sitting on the floor. We do it all the time when we are just printing one small banner and don't want to bother with the take up real.

That is what I am doing currently but it doesnt work out well. A few seconds late, and it's touching print-to-print.

Thanks for the suggestions everybody, there is a few that seems feasable.
I will not have the issue with unrolling all of it to cut since I have VersaWorks set to print one poster, then go back and cut that before printing the next. If I did the full roll, I would fear that the cut might get a bit off.

 

[biggmann]

I have a take up roller in the shop but rarely use it because if I am printing panels and there is uneven tension on the take up then I have a hard time lining up the prints so what I do is simply take a 4x8 sheet of coroplast and prop it up against the printer and as the print comes off it just slides down the ramp. A easy $8 fix.

 

[kanini]

I did hassle with cardboard sheets as a ramp on my first printer but finally chunked out a whole couple of hundred bucks on a cheap slip-clutch takeup. Best investment ever and has paid itself over and over in saved time, nerves and material. The following machines bought I have never questioned the take-up add-on since it's almost a must if you don't have a lot of spare time watching the printer carriage go back and forth... You'll be impressed even with a cheap one if you haven't had anything automated before. Good luck!