Nick Eccles
Forum Replies Created
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Do you use the Sawgrass power driver ? since we changed to that we get good results just ensuring the artwork is in RGB mode and letting the driver do the work.
Before that we used the colour profiles and colour management within the applications and we could never get a result with CorelDraw that we were really happy with, it always seemed like there was too much ink being printed and fine detail being lost. So we switched to Photoshop and illustrator and results improved.
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quote Daniel Taylor:Okay … Had a reply back from impactgs.. And it seems there’s nothing they can do, apparently because I bought the cd second hand it’s a violation of their terms. :banghead:
Just to be clear I think it’s selling the CD by itself which is a violation (by the previous owner) as they could effectively copy the disk on to Hard drive, then sell the disk and keep the book. I say this as they actually suggested selling the previous years disk & book on ebay …. which I did the income from the 2013&2104 books more than paid for my 2015 edition !!!
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Thought I would update you on this….
We bought a Mounters Mate 1600hs in the end and I have to say I am really please with the purchase.
We’ve now run about 250M through the machine including two 40+M single runs, It is easy to set up and control and the aftersales support from Omar has been outstanding. Despite the training on installation I had a couple of problems which I thought was probably down to my set-up, spoke to Omar on the phone who talked it through and gave me a couple of pointers to look at and all was sorted.
I would recommend.
Nick.
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Just thought I’d feedback, on closer inspection there was play between the bearing on the head and the guide rail, a quick adjustment and all is good now!
Thanks for the tips
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Thanks for the feedback, will let you know how it goes.
Nick
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Do you have Adobe Bridge ?
If so you can use this to create contact sheets and print either paper copies or print to PDF …. I have done it for other images that I wanted to give one of our customers so that when ordering signs they could give me the reference/filename..
I think it does depend on the file and whether a preview is a available.
Nick.
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ooops looks like I had two accounts !…. all sorted now thanks to Chris.
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Hi,
We’ve been using Metamarks’ M7 Range or Spandex IP5700 now for the last 2 years and very happy with it…
If I’ve needed a more compliant vinyl for panel curves etc I have used Avery 900 as well..
Nick
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sorry should of read the whole thread properly rather than a scan!- I’ve said the same things as Chris I think!
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If I remember rightly it could be to do with the EPS Margin setting, it’s something like Versaworks sometimes doesn’t pick up the cut line on the very edge of the image so a margin needs setting so it looks beyond image.
(or something like that – I remember with was feedback from Roland and after I set it I had no other problem)
It can be found under "File Format" in Queue settings or Job Settings I think mind was set to 0.1mm
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thanks, where do you get them from, any particular reason foe the change ?
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Just looking for options to flood coat some Correx Boards and found this thread which has been really useful. (I need one side White and the other a colour.)
A quick question, does anyone know of /recommend a supplier that will do inks suitable for Correx in a Fluorescent/neon/hiz-viz Orange ?
Thanks in advance
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it should be Canvas and Stretcher Bars
we get ours here to, the pegs go in the joints to help stretch (and restrech over time if needed)
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Finally found it from a supplier in the US….
I couldn’t find any UK Suppliers of ATV / Quad templates plenty for MX though.
I try to make my own usually but this job didn’t have the spare time to do it!
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As far as the DVLA are concerned:
"Can I sell legal plates for a car but without checking identification documents?" – Obviously you could but you would be in breach of the DVLA license conditions and breaking the law
"Or can you sell legal plates that are sold as show plates?" Legally no, any plate which has a Registration Mark on has to comply with the Law.
This is quite a helpful document: Display of Registration Marks and Register for Supply of Reg Plates
I don’t know if the rules are any different for "DVA Northern Ireland", but I would doubt it.
Also beware we were audited by DVLA within 3 month of starting and they are putting a lot of effort into on-line retailers of Number plates and doing random check/secret shopper to test procedures regarding supply of documentation – However there are only 4/5 of the DVLA Auditors/Inspectors !!
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They no longer make mine, I have the A3 OKI C821, supplied by The Magic Touch with their Firmware.
I can not recommend enough that you actually call and have a chat with the suppliers to find out if it’s the right thing for you now and any future plans…… and of course budget
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No….. TMT do "normal" Laser and White Laser Printers, have a good look on their website if I was you.
Also I would recommend you do not buy anything until you speak with them/any other supplier to make sure what you get all works together. The Magic Touch are in the UK
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quote Lola Mala:quote Nick.Eccles:A big vote for Magic touch here from us, we have used their products for a few year now, the only thing to watch out for is in the colder months the Transfer paper isn’t too cold before printing (simple solution put under heat press while it is heating (and press is open).
We use TTC for light clothing and use to use OBM for the Dark clothing (now use their Soldark on our Roland) also used their other papers to successfully.
A very good company to deal with and the presales service and support was excellent – I was talking with them on and off for 12 months before we purchased.
Magic Touch has to be with a laser or sublimation printer?
If laser, is it a white toner type, or will a regular colour laser do it?It is a Laser Printer for eth Magic Touch Papers, also speak to them I tested their papers with a good HP Laser Printer I already had and compared results with the Magic Touch updated (Firmware) OKI Laser – The TMT OKI was much better, no feed issues and colour more vibrant.
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A big vote for Magic touch here from us, we have used their products for a few year now, the only thing to watch out for is in the colder months the Transfer paper isn’t too cold before printing (simple solution put under heat press while it is heating (and press is open).
We use TTC for light clothing and use to use OBM for the Dark clothing (now use their Soldark on our Roland) also used their other papers to successfully.
A very good company to deal with and the presales service and support was excellent – I was talking with them on and off for 12 months before we purchased.
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We use Amari Plastics, always respond to requests quickly (unlike my experience of RHG) pricing is good and for us it is handy as they are local so can collect.
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We have the Tennants system and it works nothing special and nothing to complain about.
Yes you need to keep records, however we supply very little retail, we have focused on supplying Garages who themselves are registered with DVLA and therefore they keep the records and there info goes on the plate made. We were audited (along with several of our trade customers) by DVLA about 3montsh after we started and they were very happy with the set up and record keeping.
and Yes it is illegal to supply a "show plate" despite any waivers signed etc – not sure it has ever been tested in court yet though!
Extract from DVLA:
"Although the term ‘show plate’ was not recognised in law, there was clearly some
confusion as to the position. Since the introduction of RNPS, nearly a third of all
enquiries received by DVLA about the Scheme have related to the question of ‘show
plates’. Any doubts about the position have been removed by the Road Safety Act.
As the law stands, a registration plate cannot be marked as a “show plate” or “ not for
road use” simply as a means of circumventing the legal requirements.The Road Safety Act makes it an offence to supply any plate bearing a vehicle
registration mark and designed to be fitted to a vehicle or trailer that does not comply
fully with the display requirements and British Standard as contained in the Road
Vehicles (Display of Registration Marks) Regulations 2001." -
depending on volume etc we either just charge a per sqm charge like David suggested or if we have a larger job I would stick the file into VW to give me an estimate.
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depending on volume etc we either just charge a per sqm charge like David suggested or if we have a larger job I would stick the file into VW to give me an estimate.
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How does this compare to the Substance Material which is the one we use for MX Graphics?
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I now use the hemming tape from MetaMark, tried a few others had had a few failures, the MetaMark supplied one is good, even used it to repair the ceiling in my workshop with some foamboard !
for VHB tape, I get mine from Signgeer/JAG Supplies good service and product is good.
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Thanks Chris….
Ahhh I forgot I could do it like that, will try it out and may call you if I can’t get it working. Thanks for the help
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Thanks Chris, Do you use Cutting master ?
I don’t use flexi (at all) I cut direct from Corel Draw or AI using Cutting Master …
I’ve tried sharing the cutter from the PC it’s attached to but Cutting Master on the other PC will not recognise it as a cutter ? within Windows what Port type do you set it up as/share?
If you have any screen shots you could share (or PM / email) it would be great !!
Thanks in advance
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we have the same as Gary, excellent piece of Kit
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is that AI PDF the same ? just opened in AI and that Green strip with writing at the bottom doesn’t exist ?
I don’t use Flexisign but could it be the colour profile? is it worth changing to a standard CMYK first ?
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I agree with Hugh, I negotiate with the local waste company, they make money out of the recyclables so it’s in their interest to collect !
I have a 360L bin for General waste which costs £7.25 per week for a weekly collection I also have a large bin (I think 420L but could be more) for Cardboard & Paper (recyclable) I pay £4 per week again collection Weekly … (all plus VAT)
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Sorry, yes it was their Satin Poster Paper we used there, I thought we tried a gloss Art Paper
The Papers I’ve looked at are IP2409 IP2417 IP2416
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I’ve used the ones from MetaMark, although I’ve found the range better at Spandex and the results very good (printed with EcoSolvent)
Both Companies are helpful and will normally arrange samples.
Nick
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it certainly has a value, a Stone Cleaning company has mine as they put it on the Stone Surface after treatment to stop contamination….. in fact I’ve been looking for a plain paper with silicon release one side and printable the other to brand it for them !
Must admit I have sold some of our off-cuts and other waste (like 2" media tubes that we used to get on small runs) before now, it all goes in the beer kitty !)
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Looks very much like the media not getting up to temp properly…. I had a very similar problem recently and the issue was traced to picking the wrong media profile with a low Temp setting
Nick
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I only ever buy genuine OKI toner (and Roland Eco-Solvent Ink) [Many years in the IT industry before a change in career and I’ve seen the false economy cheap inks give many times!!]
Agree on DTG, when I looked at it earlier this year I came to a similar conclusion.
I guess my/our set-up is a little different in that the business is me & my wife. She works hours when our lad is at school but spends all her time on the Printables for Retail etc (eBay, Amazon, Webshop, Local Direct). I spend only 25-50% of my time on it, the rest is spent on B2B which are either higher volume printables or Vehicles, Sign & Display systems.
We hope to get someone else in soon part-time to assist on the printables especially for the Christmas Seasonal demand.
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Must admit we are looking at the OKI WT from TMT but will use it mostly for Mugs and "Leather" type printables.
We use TMTs Soldark for clothing printed on our Roland VS but is a film/Skin but produces great results.
The other option (ruling out Screen Printing) is Direct to Garment, but that has an even higher start up cost.
We have the OKI/TMT A3 printer and used their OBM before we had the VS and still use TTC, CPM and a couple of other papers occaionally. We just buy the standard CMYK Toner from Amazon.
This suits the Retail/Consumer side of our Business….
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I use Adobe Bridge (as well as for many other things!) really like it…
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not sure if this will help or if you can create from this as a base http://www.brandsoftheworld.com/logo/nissan-zero-emission
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The things we do A3 size – on largish runs it’s handy printing bigger sheets. Plus we do Large Wooden jigsaws, Photo boards, chromlux panels etc.
Looking at Paper orders we go through about 7 boxes of A4 to every 1 of A3
plus even though we do not do a lot of Sublimation Garment printing (we prefer either TMTs Soldark on our Roland or their Laser Papers) when we do we can get bigger designs on the T-Shirt in one go without having the tricky job of lining up sheets of A4 etc
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We are Registered to attend, just hoping we can find the time, if we do go it will be the Friday
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We’ve been sublimation printing for about 3-4 Years and still using all of the kit daily – plus the Flat press we bought gets used pressing clothing vinyl and printed Garment media from our Roland. (We also use some of the Laser Printed Transfer Papers from The Magic Touch)
We bought our equipment from XPRES and The Magic Touch, we have a Ricoh GX7000 A3 Printer, flat large swing away press (Adkins), Single Adkins Mug Press and about 12 months ago we bought a double Adkins Mug Press.
We have never had any blockages or blotching from the printer it has run faultless (I hope I have not jinxed it!).
My advice is do not go for a cheap press, to get a good print result you need a constant pressure and temp,
It took a while to get the Colour Management settings right in Corel Draw and Photoshop and this was worth doing to ensure what you see on the screen is actually what it looks like after printing and pressing.
We only use Sawgrass inks and TruePix paper and the Results are excellent, especially on the Metal Products.
We use various suppliers for the printables, although I’m sure a lot of the products come from the same manufacturer. We Use, TMT, XPRES, BMS and recently Coralgraph.
If you want any more info let me know
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We do a lot of this… This is how we do it:
Photoshop:
1. Use the Magic wand to select the part of the bitmap you want to keep
2. Create Path from Selection
3. Create Vector Layer from current Path
4. save (normally as pdf)Open in AI:
5. Tidy up image by deleting unwanted clipping masks
6. Select Clipping mask for outline and change stroke to the Contour cut spot colour.
7. save as epsOccasionally we have to flatten Transparancy in AI other wise the spot colour isn’t saved (it gives you a warning if needed)
As a lot of the images we do are "Cartoons" we also sometimes have to refine edge before making path in PS through trial an error we have worked out the settings and created an Action with a short-cut key so that all we do now is select the image then "Shift-F12"
Hope this helps
Nick
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I like using IP5700 from Spandex opccasionally I use Avery 800 or 900 if several curves that I can’t feed the vinyl into.
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Whoever you go to – Speak to them about pricing, don’t just go by the website we’ve set up some good discounts with our supplier after talking to several of them first…
We use the large Adkins (branded from XPRES) manual heat press (for clothing and sublimation items).
NIck
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I think Spandex might do some similar – I don’t have my catalogue to hand to check.
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quote Denise Goodfellow:quote Mo Gillis-Coates:quote David.Smith:So glad its not just us then Denise, we’ve had 5 negatives in the last month from slow postage and lost parcels through hermes. Mo, been looking at collect plus so might give them a try. Joe public don’t seem to realise how much postage is now, we get marked down for high postage charges even when we send stuff out at less than what it costs us.
The best way to get around this is offer free postage but nclude it in the price, pck the cheapest service you can find, but give them he option to upgrade to a courier for a higher free.
They can’t leave neg feedback if you offer free postage…
Bigmo
surely they can if it takes ages to arrive or doesn`t get there?
They can leave neg feedback but not low DSRs against postage costs…..
we are moving all ours to "free" postage and then pay for upgrades, plus interesting conversation with RM about a business account (we have spent £13412 on our franking account saving us just over £4000 of what it would of cost using RM On-line/Smart Stamp, a net saving of around £3k when take on board franking machine purchase price). With a Business account should get more savings plus they only have one packet size the same as it was before 2 April.
Awaiting a written proposal so will see what they are really offering then. -
Good luck… my unit is 6-800yds from the Bristol Branch still slow / unresponsive …… I get mine from Amari Plastics in Bristol very friendly and helpful and you can collect if you want
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Hi,
for what it’s worth…. We have a Franking Machine spending about £12-13,000 a year on Royal Mail. We’ve had the Franking Machine for 12 months and compare like for like with before it’s saved us around 26% on Postage which has more than paid for the franking machine at £900 (no rental, just annual maintainance)
On our eBay side of the business we effectively charge the "Stamp Price" which gives us a little to cover the running costs and fees.
With the New postage rates we’ve only really seen big increases on A2+ Size printed items in tubes and canvases that we now have to send Parcel Force or another Carrier.
There are some pluses the small parcel with range is now up to 1kg was 750g before plus teh Airmail ranges (about 30% of our eBay sales go abroad) have wider ranges which makes selling multiple items cheaper but makes it less hassle managing teh different weights and catagories.
Nick.
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Hi,
I have looked for this many times with no joy other than Blue Prints…. I now tend to photograph, then use Photo shop to create vector masks using Magic wand and then edit in Illustrator to fit (I uses paper in my VS to print templates to check).
There may be an easier way…..
Nick
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I use Amari Plastics….
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I’ve bought it at Robert Horne before….
however recently I’m finding quite unresponsive (even though they are only 500yds from our office!) so I have started using Amari Plastics, they don’t charge for cuts either (plus again local so I can collect)
Nick.
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I bought ours (12×6) from jag sign supplies / signgeer…. I believe they will also cut to size. as well as by the M.
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We use a Stainless Straight Edge & "Cut Coaster" from Jag Sign Supplies for cutting large Vinyl Runs, we also use it for Correx and Foam Board… We getting pretty accurate cuts, When cutting up long runs of print & cut stickers I using masking tapoe to fix it to the bench.
here
http://www.signgeer.com/aqshop/catalogue.php?id=1947
and
http://www.signgeer.com/aqshop/catalogue.php?id=1862 -
I’m involved in motorsport events etc and as you can imagine there are similar disclaimers… I don’t have them to hand now but have a look on the MSA (Motor Sports Association) website msauk.org there are several downloads – Marshals, Officials and competitor signing on sheets all have similar disclaimers you may be able to use etc.
However I would recommend that your firend also takes some legal/professional advise on what the disclaimer should say particuarly around the "use at own risk" especiallay if people are paying to use a facility and what in the eyes of the law are "Reasonable" precautions.
It’s a real minefield – in the past (previous career) I have been involved in a couple of IT contract litigation and the arguements about things like "Best Endeavours" vs "Reasonable Endeavours" are amazing.
Also as others have said you can’t ask someone to sign away their legal rights against negligence etc…..
Nick.
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I have used T-Cut (I think they do a special T-Cut for Gloass now in a royal blue bottle) to do similar things on car & Van windows before now..
I’ve used it with teh plastic type scouring pads as well as standard lint free cloth and even a buffing wheel…
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Thank you.
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Same here, we got our eyelet press and eylets from jag sign supplies (Signgeer).
Nick
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We have used Metamark’s MD-TX with good results, however this is a textile type media and the adhesive is quite grabby which means the surface has to be 100% perfect if you want to use it as a removeable.
However, we will shortly be trying the Arlon DPF207 which is a paper/film and DPF206 which is fabrix based – the adhesive doesn’t seem so aggresive so hopefully might be a little better for removable applications.
Nick
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quote Simon Worrall:Anyway. Back to the subject in hand. I have never had a usable result from a trace. Since you can very accurately vectorise most logos from scratch in less time than it takes to clean up the result of a trace, I don’t really see the point of them.
Simon.I’m getting to a similar conclusion….. a way I’ve used quite a bit now is using the magic wand tool on Photoshop to create a path, create a vector mask from the path then load into AI very successful
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is it just an outline cut you need ?
We have a Roland VS using versaworks, the way we do it is create a vector mask in Photoshop.
Load the file into AI and set the stroke of the Vector Mask to the Contour cut spot colour, save as EPS then load into Versaworks and it prints and cuts fine. -
Thanks Harry,
Thanks for sharing your "methods" when I read through it I thought good idea, of course….
I have copied the words and just stuck it on the bottom of my screen !
This is a great eaxmple of the value of these boards and teh willigness to share and helop others in this community !
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Great work Harry…..
I wish I could get ideas like that I can create whatever someone wants in the software but the idea in the first place is the hard bit and teh real Talent !
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Wheels – I assume you mean the bearings….
I have a CE5000/60 the o/d of the tubes on mine are 13mm not sure if it’s the same on the CE5000/120 though
Nick.
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ok should of done this before posting, I found it on the US version of the Drytac website
(hopefully this link is allowed ?)
http://www.drytac.com/drytac-ferro-metal-paper.html
Nick.
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I’ve seen it in a catalogue recently, I think it might be Dorotape….
If I remember rightly it is by Drytac – try a google for Drytac ferro
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I’ve also got a TMT supplied OKI, the C821 (A3) and I regularly take on Laser Print jobs with it, quite a few for a local Graphic Designer/Artist and he’s very happy with the Quality…
Nick.
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Thanks Nick.
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I always issue the picture of the finished Artwork complete with an explination detailing colours, type sizes and anything else relevant…..
20+ years running software development projects has taught me that agreeing requirements & Design is extremely important including one litigation !!! (oh how I do not miss that world apart from maybe the salary!)
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My thoughts exactly, just been talking to the guys that run the garage next door to me and based on what they were paying and what I can produce them for just got my first trade customerfor them !
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Mo, thanks for these posts, I’ve been in contact with LG after reading this today, extremely helpful and they are sending through a sample to see if I can print on my OKI C821 (TMT) printer to save me buying another.
Unlike another supplier of similar set up that just told me "that won’t work, you’ll need our printer and laptop pre-loaded with our special software" !!!
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Hi,
I have v43 (2013) edition and I can’t see it in there either, is the Isuzu the same as any other manufacturer ?nick.
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Gordon,
before we bought our solvent printer (roland VS) last year I experimented with some laser printer vinyl and waterproof posters (we have a good A3 Laser printer), when I tested them I stuck them to the bathroom wall and had the shower on them for a few hours !!
As for the results the stickers were ok, I even contour cut them on my plotter using regiatration marks, however they always produced a matt finsih and had to go careful handling them when fitting. I decided it wasn’t worth creating a bad reputation over them and only ever did a few for people I knew well and understood the limitations.
Now we have the VS the costs of producing are a small fraction of what they were with the Laser Printer.
Nick.
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I’m glad this topic as just resurfaced, we are located in a busy trading estate with lots of small garages and MoT testers around and have been asked many times about Numbers plates so was just researching.
Thanks for your feedback Mo :thumbup2: it has really helped us, I had been looking at Tennants so will talk to LG as well – we already have an OKI C821 A3 Laser Printed (from The Magic Touch) that is capable of printing to film so hopefully can save some start-up costs.
Cheers,
Nick.
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I have the 600mm (CE5000-60) version and had it for about 4 years and it has never missed a beat I am very happy with it, there are times when it has been running 10-12hours non-stop without complaint !
Nick
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quote Martin Cole:did you see those Giraffes fighting in the third episode of ‘Africa’ fantastic footgage
😉
:lol1: :lol1:
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quote George Elsmore:quote Harry Cleary:quote Nick.Eccles:Speaking of Rugby looking forward to the weekend and the start of the 6 Nations! (sorry gone completly OT now!)
Have the beers in!
‘Lay on the Taffys and damm be him that first cries… Hold Enough!’ (hot)3 words
ENGLAND GRAND SLAM 😉
😀 😀 I think that is a real possibility……
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Having played for years myself and watched Girls rugby I will be keeping far away !!!
Speaking of Rugby looking forward to the weekend and the start of the 6 Nations! (sorry gone completly OT now!)
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Martin, I agree amazing Camera work, I was also impressed with the new night cameras they have been using, looks almost as if it is a standard black and white film.
The other thing I noticed with this is you can really see the quality increase with HD over the standard BBC1
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Ok Thanks, I’ve also found Arlon do a product which William Smith Stock, should be getting a sample delivered today – This seems to be the most popular media for this in the US from what I can see.
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For accurate cutting, stainless steel straight edge and scalpel , we do have an A3 Guillotine (Rexel CL410 with Laser line – once set up is very accurate) for small work (and cuting sublimation sheets up for mug pressing etc).
If I’m just cutting up sheets of stickers that have already been contour cut on the VS I use the Saftey Rule Platinum and Cut Coaster from Jag Sign Supplies. (we have a 12’x6′ work bench with one piece cutting mat on).
Nick
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am I right in thinking this is the cold laminator ?
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I had a very similar problem (although it was in CD X6) the customer’s artwork had "convert stroke to outline" applied to it, this was then giving me two cut lines…
I hope this hasn’t confused things further.
Nick.
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Hi,
We have a Ricoh GX7000 which we bought in Jan2010 from XPRES, I think there is a newer model now – I think XPRES, BMS and TMT all sell it. We use the Sublijet-R Inks from Saw Grass and the Tru-Pix Sublimation paper.
Quality is good and we did notice a big imporvement in Quality improvement when we moved to Tru-Pix paper from the Standard Xpres Paper.It took a while to get the the pressure & heat settings perfected, also a move to teh SublijatR Power Driver improved out put and less hassle managing colour profiles.
The only issues we have had is the spring going on the swing away press (easy cheap to fix), the printer has been excellent, no blocking/clogging. Quality Printables is the biggest factor that impacts quality we have found.
Heat Press wise we use Adkins Presses – Large Swing away and Dual and Single Mug presses we are very happy with them.
Nick
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what a friendly place !!
I look forward to contributing to the discussions, and hopefully not just asking questions !!
cheers,
Nick
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How about metamark’s WallTex it is self adhesive and reposition able.
http://www.metamark.co.uk/Pages_dv/mdtx.html
They do various widths and I find their tech advise good regarding print settings/drying time
Nick
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Hi,
XPRES used to do subli canvas, they may still do we used to use it until we bought our VS. I’m pretty sure tmt do as we’ll and also BMS.
A very good alternative is the chromelux and photo boards that XPRES do, personally for smaller photos I think they are a much nicer finish than the subli canvas.
Hope that helps,
Nick