Vinyl for printing???????????

[redmondcopy]

Question: With a solvent printer can you print on any type vinyl or are some not meant to be printed on at all?

Thanks in advance.

 

[joeshaul]

There are special medias designed for solvent printing. Most sign supplies will refer to it as "digital print media". I do not know the chemistry behind it, but I believe the idea is the media will absorb the ink, whereas if you just print on any regular vinyl, you're essentially just slapping a layer of ink on top of it. Thus you may not get the same weather/water/uv resistance as you would if the media was designed for solvent printers.

 

[gabagoo]

you can print on regular vinyl with a solvent printer, however they say that the digital vinyl is cleaner and it also comes on a thicker liner. So let me sum up. The vinyl is cleaner and comes on a thicker backing paper and is 6" longer than 48" vinyl and is $28.00 cheaper per 50 yard roll... Yup thats right!!!! I pay less for digital white calendered than the white that you cut with. I do however believe from my experience with our cutters that the digital vinyl is not as easy to weed with small copy than the other vinyl, but that just might be my particular setup. I have in the past printed black on yellow vinyl if indeed thats the type of decal or sign we needed. I also print on white reflective and have tried printing on mac tac frosted (real cool).

 

[R08]

I've even printed on hp metalllic vinyl with great results. I've also printed on reflective vinyl that was not marked as printable and got decent results for the job I was doing.

I also found, like Gab that cutting printable media is harder to weed.

 

[redmondcopy]

Thanks for all the reply's. Where have you guys found to be the best place to order the digital media?

Thanks again,

Grant

 

[gabagoo]

for a calendered product I use General Formulations and I love it. It is made in the US of A although I do not think it is very popular as I do not see to many people discussing it here. They primarily make house brands for larger distributors like Fellers I believe. Try getting some cause I find it works quite well and always prints nice.

 

[DigiMaster]

Your limitation on range of vinyls will be your ink you use. Eco solvents are milder when it comes to bite into the media so you will have less success over a wider range of products. Full solvent inks will bite into most surfaces. In general you will have a better result on polymeric products as opposed to monomeric (cheaper range). Each printer behaves differently so adjust print speed, heater settings and ink limits in you ICC and you should be able to cover any thing. Digital print vinyls are designed to offer better print receptive surface for ink jet printing as opposed to general cut vinyls. You'll never know till you try. Frosted works like a bomb - running on Mimaki JV5/JV3 no problem. Try Mactac range as they have a frosted product formulated for Digital printing.