-
Clear digital print vinyl Verses Overlaminate film?
Clear digital print vinyl or Overlaminate film?…. which one do you prefer to laminate with??
Pro’s and Cons?
Can you Overlaminate any vinyl with Any Overlaminate?
Can you Overlaminate any vinyl with clear digital print film?
-
8 Replies
-
Vic
proper laminate has UV inhibitors to help protect the printKev
-
Hi,
Have you ever done the opposite and used laminate as clear print vinyl ?
I did, it had to be done for the next morning (last minute request) go on the inside of a window and I had no clear print vinyl. It wasn’t to stay on long so didn’t really matter 🙂
As for your question, you should also use polymer laminate with polymer vinyls or monomer with monomer vinyls and not mix them 🙂
-
If mixing make sure the laminate is as good or better than the vinyl …. Never the other way around.
Chris Wool always says if it doesn’t say laminate on the box then it’s not a proper laminate so uv wouldn’t be as good I suspect
I use the LG clear poly printable laminate, which is sold as laminate although I don’t think it mentions it on the box…..wink: I find it a breeze to use through
the laminator which is why I tend to stick with it. -
Up until now I always thought i was laminating our prints with laminate film, unaware that it was actually clear print vinyl. As i’m not incharge of buying here, I use what i’m given and to be honest i always thought clear and laminate were the same 😳 well every days a learning curve.
As we use 3M digital white we also use 3M clear aswell so it made sense to the boss to just use the Clear as a laminate. We’ve not had any problems doing this so i was curious as to wether this was ok.
I did once laminate a print with Matt laminate by mistake, as my eyes are startin to go lol, and then covered it in clear film but the clear print film never stuck down and just came off when applying to a van.
So apart from the UV aspects of the two, would it be wrong to use Clear Digital Vinyl as a Laminate?
-
I’m no expert on this Vic,
but I would understand clear vinyl not to be a true laminate due to the UV factor only.
So to answer your question Clear matching vinyl is fine to laminate with. -
It comes down to application & how it’s sold I guess.
In theory an unlaminated print will last just as long as one covered with a clear print film because the print film contains nothing to prolong the fading effects from UV.On a vehicle the graphics don’t fade any quicker than they do anywhere else, the prints fade because power washers, chemicals from cleaning & general traffic pollution physically wear the ink away from the print if left unprotected. The laminate forms a physical barrier to stop this happening.
Vic if your flitting the clear print film to act as a physical barrier against abrasion then the answer is yes it will do just as good a job as a more expensive laminate. If it’s to increase the print life by reducing fading then no it doesn’t do the same job.
-
Hi Martin
i would have said that due to thinking that the word laminate over clear vinyl that the laminate would be more optically clear and more dedicated to the job,
years ago clear vinyl was not that clear would yellow etc. and the glue left a lot of silvering.the latest round of modern clear vinyl’s are a lot better than before making them very usable. but as said matching is so important.
large digital printing and wraps we always use the manufactures match. but for smaller stuff we mix and match according to the end use so have a range of different clears each with there own plus points
some wrap lams will print well for fine stuff, oracle 751 very clear high gloss does not print well to the very thick MX laminate plus stuff in between. -
We have laminated small prints with clear when in a fix.
Laminating using clear I would have thought will make the decal quite thick. As the laminate we use has got to be about half the thickness.
If laminate and clear is the same why do they offer just one product.
Log in to reply.