# Heat press discoloring polyester fabric during dye sub



## Trekker45 (Dec 2, 2012)

I had some 100% polyester, flat back mesh fabric sublimated the other day. When the fabric came out the dye sub looked great but the entire area that was in the heat press had a sheen to it. I was told that the fabric just gets pressed that way and the only way to fix it is to press the entire piece of material first and make it all match up then do the dye sub. Is there any other way? I was told that the dye sub has to be at 400* and under a certain pressure or it won't work. How do people do piece sublimation without causing the area under the heat to look like its been over ironed? I hope this makes sense . Thanks in advance to all you experts out there.


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## GordonM (May 21, 2012)

There are certain kinds of fabrics, polyester or otherwise, that cannot be heat pressed at all. If doing shirts, you should always use apparel made for subbing. If you must use your own fabrics, you may need to try several to find a good material that won't take on this sheen. The sheen is basically the top layer of the polyester reaching close to its plastic (not yet melting) phase.

With that out of the way, because of the way regular (non-Ricoh) Sawgrass inks work they sublimate best at 400 degrees, or thereabouts. If you're not using Sawgrass inks you may have more latitude with the temperature. Many sub inks start to sublimate at temperatures just above the boiling point of water, but the transition to a gas is very slow at these temps. You'll get better results with 300 degrees or better, with about 325-350 a practical minimum.

What you should do is cut up some scrap fabric and try pressing it at various temperatures. The lower the temp the longer you should press for. You're looking to balance time/temperature and minimize the sheening. Most fabrics don't need heavy pressure; light to medium is fine. You can try with and without a Teflon sheet on the top.

Folks like RidersReady work with different polyester fabrics on a daily basis (I never sub to mesh jersey material, and dislike it for vinyl heat transfers as well) and I'm sure will have more suggestions.


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## Riderz Ready (Sep 18, 2008)

There are shirts, even made for dye subbing, that will give you a sheen. Nothing you can do about. It depends on brand and color from our experience.

As Gordon mentioned times are all over the place in dye sub and it depends on the substrate. We use SubliDecal and it is 350 degrees. 

For apparel we use the "10 rule". Meaning we set the press for 395 for 50 seconds and whether it is time or temp if we run within 10 of each setting, high or low, you cannot see the difference. 

The trick with heat presses is that many are not displaying the correct temp. Our Maxipress was off 20 degrees. If you are having issues you may ant to check your presses actual tempature versus its displayed tempature.


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## D.Evo. (Mar 31, 2006)

As the boys said - some fabrics are just prone to this extra sheen...

To try and minimise the sheen I would play around with settings. If you already have a ruined shirt - cut it up into swatches and press them at different combinatons of time, temp and pressure. 
From experience - high pressure (more than anything) adds shine to sports garments as it flattens the texture of the fabric.
Personally (based on my particular inks, paper and equipment) I would press sports mesh at 180-185C for 60-65 sec on light pressure. 
When you drop down the temperature, you might need to increase dwell time.


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