SUb Tree Decorations (Bells).

[NikGrey]

Went to visit the 'corner stone' of the business yesterday, he gave me some things to try (which I am about to do) but cant find anyone who is stocking them.. so - no doubt I will be pleased with how these turn up but cant find any to buy

Anyone know who stocks these little gems right now ?

[ArferMo]

Longforte.... New items

[NikGrey]

Perfect, thanks for that ArferMo - I bought some.

Does anyone have a template for these perhaps?

I think these will be quite popular, I have asked a few people what they thought and the response was encouraging

I'm guessing a sheet of Teflon will make up the distance of the bow at the top of this Bell ? 180c for 4 mins they say..hmm.

[NikGrey]

Just bought some Poppy Red Satin 6mm Ribbon to finish these with.

A question on pressing though:

As the listing states 4 minutes (240 secs) at 180c I am assuming BOTH sides are completed in One pressing ?

Could somebody who has made these before please share a little wisdom please as I have never done these before.

[ArferMo]

Try a TMT "A" pad

One side will overcook though. Or gas off and fade depending how you do it

[viccar]

I tried a few of these last xmas and had a job to get them pressed, looking good, and never managed both sides without cracking them, the raised bow can be a problem,

[NikGrey]

As you can see I cannot get my paper into the recesses of the Bow - I was using my 3mm Silicon Rubber Mat (used for my aluminium water bottles).

I have ordered a 1.5mm sheet of this rubber matting in the hope that this new smaller size will help get into this recess !

I tried doing both sides at once, the top side (seen here) I can tweak but the bottom hardly worked at all (miniscule ink transfer) so clearly I will need to print One side at a time.

I was pressing at 180 (platen tested at 167c with my thermo IR machine - but thats a whole other story I have already been through on here) for 240 seconds - I have raised the temp to 200c for the next attempt (platen should be near 180 now).. I only have another 2 of these decorations at the moment for testing so will try to make big changes for each test so I can work out what is going wrong.

It would be lovely if someone who has successfully produced these before with a flat heat press could chime in with advice

I know that 'Our tall Friend' did produce these well but that was in a vacuum oven.

[NikGrey]

Had a few breakages but I have perfected this:

[homerismyidol]

How did you manage to perfect it?

[NikGrey]

You don't know me - dogged determination.

205c for 240 secs.
One side at a time (with transfer paper on the top).
1.5mm 'Special' Silicone Rubber mat (on top).

But ABOVE ALL I had to suffer a lot of breakages finding the correct PRESSURE (on my adkins) - I even tried cutting a bell shaped hole from a mouse mat in an attempt to print both sides at once !

If you are going to do this you should expect to waste a few quid on research (breaking things).