# 1st job printing big image + over seam (pics)



## Steelheader100 (Jan 18, 2007)

I just wanted to share my experience printing a large image that also went over a sleeve seam. I know it's been discussed on the forum before. I just did 550 shirts for a radio station's battle of the bands and I think they turned out pretty good. First we had to make a shirt board out of melamine that was big enough and shaped right for printing over the seam. Then we had to build a screen that was long enough but not too wide to fit in our side clamps. We did this by taking the shorter bars from our regular newman auto frames and taking some longer ones from some sign making size frames and frankensteining them together. We had two sizes of the image. One for smalls and mediums and one for L,XL,XXL. We used Matsui spot black water base ink for the guitar. I was very impressed with this ink it did not dry in the mesh during the whole 11 hour run. We even had a bunch of halftones in the image. We used a 17 inch wide 70 durometer squeegee two passes with a flood stroke. The rest of the shirt was printed with union plastisol ink. The water base ink did not build up at all on the underside of the screen and I did not have to wipe the screen at all. It just printed right over the seam no problem. With such a long screen it was too heavy for our presses springs to hold up so we would rest it on one of the other shirt boards while loading a shirt. I'm going to try printing over the seam a little more soon as this one just went over a little. I've got some Matsui discharge to try also. Anyone else printing over seams or collars? Any tips?


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## marcelolopez (Jul 16, 2007)

Wow very impressive and nice job !!
Thank you for sharing it.


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## mtnbike45 (Jan 24, 2008)

Your shirts look great to me and looks like printing over seam was not a problem.


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## Ken Styles (Mar 16, 2006)

Awesome!.

Where did you get the malamine?


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## Steelheader100 (Jan 18, 2007)

We got it at Home Depot. We made a pattern on butcher paper, traced it onto the melamine and cut it out with a jigsaw, sanded the edges a little and attached a mounting bracket.


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## Ken Styles (Mar 16, 2006)

The platten, dimensions and manufacturing of the screen, ink choices and design placement are all what this business is about. "Create and they will buy".
it's a great feeling to build things from scratch and then see others proudly displaying your hard work.


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## midwaste (Apr 8, 2008)

Awesome.

Gotta love the DIY aspect. Got nothing against the high-end purchased platens, but, come on, there's really nothing to them.

They'd have paid pretty heavy for those spot colors on the back though...man


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## zymerguyer (Feb 15, 2007)

I was wondering, did you have to make a notch in the platen were the seam ran to get it the same level as the rest of the shirt or just print with the hump? Did you have any problems with blurring near the seam?


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## rednex_graphix08 (Apr 10, 2008)

awesome job love the design and the print good job


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## JeffroDesigns (Apr 22, 2008)

I love the artwork, nice print work!

I'm working on a wrap around print and my partner luckily builds his own pallets!

I like the design of your setup, nice work!

~Jeffro


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## Steelheader100 (Jan 18, 2007)

No there was not a notch in the platten for the seam to drop into. With every shirt being a little different and also different sizes I think it would be hard to load the shirt and have the seam fall into a notch. With the waterbase ink it was not a problem. It just kind of soaked in even if the seam was in different places on the board from shirt to shirt. I do hope to try and print over a full zip sweatshirt before too long and I will be making a channel for the zipper to fall into for that.


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## gp1305 (Oct 17, 2007)

That is wicked looking indeed.


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## acanvas (Sep 27, 2007)

you rock, people think were nuts but we do this crazy diy stuff all the time. our studio is full of plattens oddly shaped, one armed, grooves cut through for arm seams grooves cut out for side seams etc. When a cool job comes our way there is no way we can say no...we just figure out what to build and make it happen!! We're printing tonight on the extra long plattens just made for a huge all over front image. NICE JOB the shirt is gorgeous! Be proud, this is how the artist we respect in this industry do it...they don't wait around until a special machine is made...


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## theloin (Jul 28, 2007)

How thick was the melamine board you purchased? I want to try this for some designs I've conceptualized. 

I've made my own shirt boards for toddler shirts that were printed much in the same way as your adult print here. I used Ikea furniture pieces. Same coating as my pallets on my printa. Free material as well. I didn't have to create my own long screen though, that's great.

May I ask how much of a premium you charged for the one color print? I print over seams on some jobs and charge a 3 color price, but I have to wipe. I'll try the water base approach. Maybe save myself some time.

Thanks for sharing this.


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## Steelheader100 (Jan 18, 2007)

The melamine looks like it's about 3/4" thick. I'm not sure how much we will charge for this kind of thing. It hasn't come up much. We worked out some trade with the radio station on this one. I think we will raise our screen prep charge to cover the extra mesh and emulsion costs though. The waterbase ink worked great. I did some tests on another image with discharge over seams, collars and hoodie pockets and it worked ok but the white built up a little on the hoodie pockets. I may try some neoprene on my pallet and see if that helps any with seams.


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## Sheepsalt (Sep 12, 2007)

Looks great! It's amazing how much of that stuff that "can't be done" ends up working out after all when you just try, huh? WB over seams works pretty well. Even Plastisol with some reasonable preparation.

How'd your arms hold up pulling that 17" squeegee 1100 times? We did a 20"-wide 4-color print on the manual press, and my arms were killing me by the end of the day.


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## lavish909 (Jun 4, 2007)

Looks good, What mesh did you use for the Matsui spot black?


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## Steelheader100 (Jan 18, 2007)

I think it was 175 mesh.


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## RELISH (Apr 9, 2011)

I know this post is old, but thank you for the inspiration.


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