• I want to thank all the members that have upgraded your accounts. I truly appreciate your support of the site monetarily. Supporting the site keeps this site up and running as a lot of work daily goes on behind the scenes. Click to Support Signs101 ...

Mug Press Suggestions

mikekomm

New Member
My company is just starting to produce coffee mugs with sublimation transfers that we are printing with a Ricoh 3110. We have a small convection oven to do do most of the tranfering but we also want to purchase a good quality mug press for doing those designs that extend from the very top to the bottom of the mugs. We've been told that using a "wrap" in a convection oven will not work for "top to bottom" designs. If this is true, what is a good mug press in the market that will do this type of transfer. We expect to printing 400-500 mugs per month in the press so we need a machine that will hold up well. Any suggestions will be appreciated.
 

headfirst

New Member
My company is just starting to produce coffee mugs with sublimation transfers that we are printing with a Ricoh 3110. We have a small convection oven to do do most of the tranfering but we also want to purchase a good quality mug press for doing those designs that extend from the very top to the bottom of the mugs. We've been told that using a "wrap" in a convection oven will not work for "top to bottom" designs. If this is true, what is a good mug press in the market that will do this type of transfer. We expect to printing 400-500 mugs per month in the press so we need a machine that will hold up well. Any suggestions will be appreciated.

You've got that backwards. Some mug presses will do a full wrap but none of them do it well. For a full wrap you want a high quality silicone rubber wrap and an oven. Convection ovens work well, but for the volume you're discussing you might want to consider a hix conveyor oven for mugs.

A conveyor will give you room to expand past the 500 mug per month point.

If you're determined to stay small format you'll want to get a few convection ovens and at least 36 wraps. We run three ovens with 6 mugs per oven and a full set to load up while those are cooking.
 

WildWestDesigns

Active Member
Some mug presses will do a full wrap but none of them do it well.

Your higher quality mug presses will do very well with full wraps. I still run a couple of mug presses for just the smaller runs.

Heat and pressure (pressure over as much areas as you can when doing full wraps) are your biggest enemies. Keeping those as constant as you can at the levels that they need to be at for the substrate, that's where good quality equipment comes in. Now with the mug presses you do have to keep up with that just a little bit more then the wraps and that's probably were headfirst's comment comes in ( I think). You want to keep a spare heater band on those, those seem to need to be switch out more then your wraps.


but for the volume you're discussing you might want to consider a hix conveyor oven for mugs.

Now, having said what I did above, I would agree that the OP would be better served to do this.
 

binki

New Member
That is 23 mugs a day, not a lot for big time production but I would look at a wide format dyesub printer if you get any bigger. You costs will go down about 90% if you do that.
 

mikekomm

New Member
Any suggestions for the best wraps to purchase. I picked up 5 to start with from our local supplier. I tried a top to bottom print and it turned out great. I've heard many different ideas on the life expectancy of the wraps. Everything from 50 pcs. - 1,000 pcs .... both numbers can't be right :( .... Our initial convection oven tests have been at 400F for 15 minutes with good results....can that time be cut back?
 

wmshuman

New Member
We do full sublimation mug wraps with the Geo Knight DK3. They are printed completely top to bottom and all the way around to the handle except for about an 1/8th inch on each side of the handle. It is as close as you are going to get unless you are painting and glazing them yourself. Buy a good reputable (American made) heat press and you won't have any problems. I personally think the rubber wraps are junk and they take way to long to print, basically up to 20 minutes per mug. Not too mention, they get brittle after using them about 25 times. Stick with the press and if you need to print massive quantities, buy more heat presses. We can realistic print 72 - 11 ounce full wrapped mugs in an 8 hour day. That's using a single press too. Just got to keep them going non-stop. Once one is done another has to go on the press.
 

BESTBLANKS

New Member
Sublimation Printing on Mugs

I realize this is an old post but since we are new to this forum I just wanted to add our 2 cents. The DK3 mug press is a very good machine. We recommend this model for most customers printing mugs. The mug press quality (or mug oven for high volume needs) is really only half the answer to producing quality printed mugs. The mug quality is critical. If your goal is to print full wrap and/or top to bottom full bleed images this can be tricky because in order to do this consistently the mug cylinder has to be true (ie: with little to no taper at the top and bottom of the mugs). If you would like professional help with this project please give us a call or visit our website www.bestblanks.com 888-431-7385 or 954-989-1250. Thanks for reading!

top2_08.png
top2_09.png
 
Top