Printing on color vinyl.

[Andy D]

Something I do from time to time is to print onto color vinyl, for example:
I have a local college that needs some vehicle door vinyl that has small copy with thin strokes,
very hard to weed and not clean looking on printed and laminated white vinyl.
What I do is use cut vinyl that is the closest color I have; in this case their copy is burgundy so
I used dark red. I print a gradient numbered bar (image below) from nothing to their color and find the spot that looks best.
The color is much more even and it's so much easier to weed.
I don't laminate because if the vinyl were to be scratched, or the ink fade, the dark red will blend in.
This wouldn't be practical with a logo with many different colors, but in this case it works great.

 

[Andy D]

This is a close up of the final print and weed:

 

[eahicks]

Pretty cool idea. I generally tell customers, though, that any part of their graphic that is too small to cut from a laminated print will have to be regular cut vinyl, which will be one of only a few colors.
I have in the past printed on metallic silver to get custom metallic colors. Works pretty well.

 

[Geneva Olson]

how

Something I do from time to time is to print onto color vinyl, for example:
I have a local college that needs some vehicle door vinyl that has small copy with thin strokes,
very hard to weed and not clean looking on printed and laminated white vinyl.
What I do is use cut vinyl that is the closest color I have; in this case their copy is burgundy so
I used dark red. I print a gradient numbered bar (image below) from nothing to their color and find the spot that looks best.
The color is much more even and it's so much easier to weed.
I don't laminate because if the vinyl were to be scratched, or the ink fade, the dark red will blend in.
This wouldn't be practical with a logo with many different colors, but in this case it works great.

View attachment 148863

So how do you do the gradient number bar? I just had a client come in and wanted a decal to match the color of his seats on his golf cart. I did a random color selection based on another decal he brought me. I wanted a more standard way of doing it other than "let me pick this one and move my color over a little on the spectrum for 3-4 prints".

 

[Andy D]

What brand/series are you printing on?

3M IJ35.
The other part of it was the color was so much smoother than when I first tried to print and laminate 3M IJ35...

 

[Andy D]

So how do you do the gradient number bar? ".

That depends on what software you use..
You can probably YouTube it.

 

[Pixels Are Bad Mmmkay?]

Pretty cool idea. I generally tell customers, though, that any part of their graphic that is too small to cut from a laminated print will have to be regular cut vinyl, which will be one of only a few colors.
I have in the past printed on metallic silver to get custom metallic colors. Works pretty well.

I love printing on 3M 1080 (soon to be 2080) white aluminum metallic or Orafol 970RA silver metallic.

 

[Pewter0000]

Not going to lie, I've never tried printing on any vinyls that come pre-coloured! I just assumed it would like, bead and fall off or something. Is this part of regular practice? Not something I've been trained on!

I love printing on 3M 1080 (soon to be 2080)

Don't forget to take the protective film off

 

[Andy D]

The colored vinyl is ij35?

No, that's the printable white vinyl I first did the door vinyl on and wasn't happy with the finish or the cut.

On the red that I printed burgundy, you would think it was burgundy cut vinyl.

 

[Pixels Are Bad Mmmkay?]

Don't forget to take the protective film off

Yeah, we just sat through Grimco's 3M virtual trade show demos yesterday and they were talking about the protective covering on the new 2080 and it has me thinking I may just have to print on Orajet 970RA instead because removing that film and not contaminating the surface or kinking the film, etc. sounds like more of a PITA than it's worth. It's already bad enough we have to slit 6" off the end of the roll every time we order 1080 just to be able to run it through our 54" printer.

 

[bob]

Not going to lie, I've never tried printing on any vinyls that come pre-coloured! I just assumed it would like, bead and fall off or something. Is this part of regular practice? Not something I've been trained on!...

Vinyl is pretty much vinyl. The only difference between printable vinyl and all other vinyl, colored or not, is that the printable vinyl is handled in such a way as to prevent any oily handprints.

I print on silver vinyl all of the time, never a problem.

 

[Pewter0000]

Yeah, we just sat through Grimco's 3M virtual trade show demos yesterday and they were talking about the protective covering on the new 2080 and it has me thinking I may just have to print on Orajet 970RA instead because removing that film and not contaminating the surface or kinking the film, etc. sounds like more of a PITA than it's worth. It's already bad enough we have to slit 6" off the end of the roll every time we order 1080 just to be able to run it through our 54" printer.

Honestly, we had a roll of 2080 for a seadoo job, and our installer hated it. He said he's just so used to working carefully with uncovered vinyl that it felt unnatural and difficult to tell if he was bubbling or wrinkling. Now that might just be him being stubborn, but he's the one applying so we try our best to support what he wants.

And then there's the time that we contour cut a few letters, only to realize we had left the coating on some cast 3M chrome. Not fun to pick the letters individually, but that stuff's expensive, so we sucked it up. Won't make that mistake again!