# Aomya Sublimation Ink - Any Used it?



## BennTec (Apr 14, 2009)

Hey guys, 

I've been looking to import inks over to keep cost down. 

I've come across this company on Alibaba Aomya Sublimation Ink. 

I have been quoted really good prices. Has anyone tried this company / Sublimation inks?.

Some feedback would be very useful. 

Regards
Benn


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## bakaichi (May 1, 2007)

Typically in china

the price ball park i find for inks are 

China made .~$17/L
China Import (korean) $23/L
and some korea / italy import ink ~$80 /L

Personally for small format printer im ok playing with china made ink, coz if anything happen the damage is not to big.

But on large format printer, i don't think i trust china made ink.

I use china ink on my Epson 1430, it work ok, no clog. but just no icc profile.


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## BennTec (Apr 14, 2009)

Hi, 

Great, Thanks for your feedback. 

Prices your saying match what I am getting quoted. 
I'm looking at manoukian aswell I believe that can be korean/Italian, I've heard good things. 

Icc profile is not an issue, I can get one made. 

Alot of quotes coming in, it really is deciding on the company to trust now.


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## pisquee (Jan 8, 2012)

If you're importing you may as well go for a known good brand, rather than an unknown.
When we started, we were importing InkTec (Korean) from Elephant Digital in China for about 50USD per litre (ex works)
We found them a good company to deal with, and had no problems with them.


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## BennTec (Apr 14, 2009)

Thanks Pisquee, 

I've seen inktec alot on various sites but always curious of other brands. I shall check 'Elephant' out. 

Slightly off topic but I have found a useful tool for anyone looking to import and worried about import tax/duty. 

dutycalculator


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## gorillashirt (Jul 16, 2014)

I've also started importing ink from China. I'm having some color issues though. When I print through the sawgrass powerdriver, I get horizontal lines. (It's a brand new printer, less than 20 pages printed, aligned properly). When I print with no color profile, it looks "ok" but kinda dark and has a slight red tint.

Can anyone tell me how to make a custom ICC profile? 

If that is out of the question, can anyone recommend an ink manufacturer that provides ICC profiles for certain printer+paper+ink combos?

I'm SO SICK of paying up the *** for sawgrass inks....
Please! thank you!


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## BennTec (Apr 14, 2009)

Hi Gorilla, 

There are Ebay sellers who can create ICC profiles 
I presume you are in the US so here is a link


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## Sacman (Jan 20, 2014)

Wow! I've been looking at Chinese ink for several weeks but have not pulled the trigger because of profiles. I had no idea that there were relatively inexpensive services out there to make profiles. I asked the Aomya supplier about profiles and they responded today saying they don't provide them. Was disappointed but now not so much. I have been using Chinese eco solvents for about a year now and have always had grey problems and a red tint. I have gotten pretty good at color correcting them out but this would have been nice to know a year ago. Just never thought to search for it. I got to a point where I could no longer tell a good grey from a bad and just rolled with it. My particular product was not super critical so I could get away with it. 

Thanks BennTec for the great tip!!!

Wade


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## EZTeesArt (Sep 19, 2013)

There are lots of places that build custom ICC profiles! The equipment is only around $1000 for a spectrophotometer and profiling software, so there's usually someone out there who will do it cheap. If you're going to do a lot of different processes and substrates, it can be worth buying one and doing it yourself. I have an i1 I got off Craigslist for super cheap, and once an IPS display and printer/ink/substrate combination is all profiled with the same device, the accuracy is amazing.


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## Sacman (Jan 20, 2014)

Since Tom has bumped this thread, I will add my feedback. 

I have been using this ink for several months with excellent results. I have never had a clog and have left the printer sit for as long as two or three weeks. I use Cobra profiles which have done a fine job for me. I pretty much use the PLPP profile for everything. Skin tones don't always translate perfectly but work fine for my purposes.


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## Sacman (Jan 20, 2014)

Tom, 

Clear your private messages. I can't send anything to you.


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## BennTec (Apr 14, 2009)

Hi Sacman, 

Great to hear from somebody who as used these inks and great to hear you are getting good results. I've had enough of SG inks, costing a fortune and constantly screwing up my printers. 

Other printing methods have distracted me of late but i will certainly look into getting these inks after hearing positive feedback.


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## BennTec (Apr 14, 2009)

Oh just a thought Sacman on the colour black!?. 

Can you tell me how the black turns out. Ive seen some chinese inks and the black is not very deep.


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## Sacman (Jan 20, 2014)

I have nothing to compare with but I have been very happy. They are deep enough for me. I print a lot of coin purses which are neoprene and due to the fabric texture, most colors don't come out super saturated. However, I have also printed on satin and another poly fabric called peachskin and the results are stunning. Again, with nothing to compare to I think the blacks are very well saturated. 

The blacks I have pressed onto solid surfaces like dog tags couldn't be any more black. So for me that is the ultimate test. I have learned a lot in pressing fabrics and I don't know if it is the inks or my press but I have had to significantly increase times to get a good solid transfer. 

Hope that helps. If you decide to go with these inks, post back on what you find. I'm curious to know how they compare and they are so cheap it doesn't cost a fortune to find out.


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## catldavis (Mar 31, 2012)

It was slow shipping, but I just got my Aomya ink in yesterday. I can't wait to see how well they work. I will report back once I've had an opportunity to print with them.


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## ATKOgirl (Mar 28, 2015)

Hi,

Any further feedback on how the Aomya inks compare to Cobra or Sawgrass?

Also, is there a specific sublimation paper that works better with the Aomya? I'm looking to do both soft and hard surfaces, so I'd be interested in feedback on paper for both.

Thanks!
Maria


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## EZTeesArt (Sep 19, 2013)

ATKOgirl said:


> Hi,
> 
> Any further feedback on how the Aomya inks compare to Cobra or Sawgrass?
> 
> ...


I don't have experience with the other inks, but I did get the Aomya inks, and try them in a converted Epson 1440 with a CIS and waste ink tank. I built a custom ICC profile with a spectrophotometer.

The prints on white polyester tees were absolutely spectacular. The gamut is fantastic, and the colors were dead-on. We'd never seen anything look so good on a shirt. While I don't have direct comparisons with other inks, I honestly can't imagine they can beat this in any significant way.

However, with that setup - a converted Epson 1440 with a CIS - we did end up getting ink cross contamination. That is, ink from one head would somehow draw up into another head when the printer sat - like it was running out of the head into the capping station and siphoning up into another channel of the head. This might be inherent to the ink (too low viscocity, or something) or it may have been unique to our situation (lint fibers on the capping station wicking ink from the head, or something like that).


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## ATKOgirl (Mar 28, 2015)

Hi Tom,

Thanks so much for your response! Your review is perfect, spot-on for me!

I am looking to do an Epson 1430 with the Aomya inks using refillable cartridges rather than a CIS. I had read that some people have issues (in general) with the lines clogging on CIS systems, so I decided against that. I already use an old Epson 1400 with refillable cartridges using aftermarket inks, so I know the process works for me. It is essentially the same printer, but without wireless. It has been a workhorse for me, so I am very hopeful that the 1430 will be the same.

Are you still using the system with the cross-contamination issue? If not, what was your resolution? I am hoping that the issue you mentioned is due to the CIS and I won't have the same issue. I hope you found a satisfactory resolution.

Also, if you don't mind my asking, what sublimation paper do use?

Thank you so much again!
Maria


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## EZTeesArt (Sep 19, 2013)

ATKOgirl said:


> Hi Tom,
> 
> Thanks so much for your response! Your review is perfect, spot-on for me!
> 
> ...


We used Coastal's Image Right sheets. We tried several time / temperature / pressure combinations to arrive at the one with the most complete release without any shirt shrinkage. I don't recall the answer for what was best, but I'll see if anyone else remembers.

FYI, I had meant Epson 1430, not 1440. Typo. I also have a 1400 that has been a total workhorse.

Our solution to the cross-contamination issue was to stop doing dye sub. For us, this was just a test - using an inkjet and 3rd part inks and building our own profile, what kind of results could we get? The answer was awesome. But it's for a sizable company, and the test was only to help answer the question "do we want to do this for real." "For real" meaning investing in heavy-duty, fast, professional equipment, adding this as a process to our website. In the end, we decided we'd probably only add it if we were going to do all-over dye sub, and we didn't want to undertake the development time to add that capability to our website at the time. So while the printed results were awesome, it was just a test and we haven't proceeded beyond that yet.

When we were using it for a while, if the printer had sat for any length of time - even a day - we just had to flush a ton of ink through the heads to get them back to having the right colors flowing. If it more than a few days between uses, you could even see the contamination making it's way past the head and back up into the CIS lines. Unless we kept it printing constantly,. we'd waste 90% of our ink in head flushes getting rid of the contamination.

I'm hoping that was unique to our setup, but can't guarantee it. Might have been unique to the CIS and you won't get it with refillable carts. I don't know. There were more things we could have tried - replacing the capping station, crimping the CIS lines when not in use, checking for air leaks in the CIS containers, putting the printer on a stand and moving the CIS containers to a lower elevation. But we'd already gotten the answer to the question we were testing (The answer being "yes, we can get stunning prints with the cheap Aomya inks") and that was really our only goal, so we just shut the experiment down since the contamination was being a PITA.


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## willd (Apr 20, 2015)

I'm no specialist in ciss systems, but that sounds as though the ink tanks weren't vented, thus pulling a low vacuum when printing. The tank with most ink used would have lowest pressure within, thus sucking ink from higher pressure tanks until the pressure was sufficiently balanced...


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## EZTeesArt (Sep 19, 2013)

Thank you! Good thought, that makes sense. If I ever end up in that situation again, I'll try relieving vacuum on the tanks.


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## ATKOgirl (Mar 28, 2015)

Hi Tom,

Thanks so much for the recommendation on the Coastal Image Right sheets. I'm just about to pull the trigger on everything now!

I'm looking to do more home textiles like placemats and pillows, and decorative "hard" items like slates, frames etc. 

Even if you were just doing a test, I'm glad you had success. Please know that your information has benefited me TREMENDOUSLY!

My goal is to someday expand to all-over printing and to be setup a wide-format "print, cut, sew" operation, again for home textiles. However, if that comes to fruition, it will be far, far down the road. Right now, I am able to outsource those products.

Again, thank you so much for your information. It has been tremendously helpful!

Best regards,
Maria




EZTeesArt said:


> We used Coastal's Image Right sheets. We tried several time / temperature / pressure combinations to arrive at the one with the most complete release without any shirt shrinkage. I don't recall the answer for what was best, but I'll see if anyone else remembers.
> 
> FYI, I had meant Epson 1430, not 1440. Typo. I also have a 1400 that has been a total workhorse.
> 
> ...


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