Look what happens when I am bored... :-)

[Justin]

Lol, good job Jason doesn't get on here much! He's too busy doing........well, who knows eh??

Completely agree about the investment level, makes perfect sense.

[mrs maggot]

We have an Argos clearance place near us, fan ovens were £60 the other day!

[pisquee]

Would love to use an oven, and did try to crack it, but the wraps we got wouldn't go tight enough to get a good print, and tried shrink wrap but it melted into a horrible mess.
Wasted 100s of mugs trying to get it right
The oven's now in our kitchen doing a grand job, having replaced the crap gas one that came with the house (which was condemned for leaking!)
We did experiment with full wrap printing and the handles, and bases, and the whisky glasses.
Also, had problems with gassing of the inks leaving a dirty coloured print on the exposed areas of the mugs, which led to even more taping/wrapping to seal in the mugs, which took more time, and used a redicolous amount if tape per mug - when we costed out the additional labour and heat tape it just didn't work compared to 4 presses and one member of staff.
I loved that we could get 24 mugs in the oven at a time, and would love to again if we could have solved the problems

[Jason]

Only superior in age

I'm busy trying to get my head around screen printing . Its true my superior put me onto the oven and its definitely my preferred way of doing mugs, no more manically trying to operate 5 presses for me.

Mug looks really good by the way Simon, I still need to get some of that stuff and have a play.

cheers

[Customprintwales]

Those look great.

Are you using the vacuum wraps from Best Subs. I've been looking at those and wondering whether I should spend the money on a vacuum oven.

[webtrekker]

Nice work SG. I'm a tinkerer myself so have a lot of respect for what you've achieved here.

[Justin]

Only superior in age

I'm busy trying to get my head around screen printing . Its true my superior put me onto the oven and its definitely my preferred way of doing mugs, no more manically trying to operate 5 presses for me.

Mug looks really good by the way Simon, I still need to get some of that stuff and have a play.

cheers

Wow! Everybody we have a royal visitor us honouring us with his presence! Haha, nice of you to find the time to pop in and say hi to us mere mortals bud

[socialgiraffe]

Mug looks really good by the way Simon, I still need to get some of that stuff and have a play.

Yes, you must. I have seen some of your work and know that you are a "high end" printer, this stuff really plays into your customers.

Would love to use an oven, and did try to crack it, but the wraps we got wouldn't go tight enough to get a good print, and tried shrink wrap but it melted into a horrible mess.

A few comments to be made, firstly regarding wraps, if I remember correctly you manufacture your own mugs. If this is the case what diameter are they? Pretty much any new mug wrap can hold a print in place for "standard" mugs so if the wrap is not holding the paper securely then I can only presume your mugs are considerably less in diameter.

The blue hue you talk of is very easily solved if you follow these steps.

For guidance lets assume the mug I am using is 92mm deep and has a circumference of 243mm MINUS the handle.

Print your image on a piece of sub paper that measures 105mm high and 240mm wide.
If you require full top to bottom bleed then make the printed height 94mm MAX (no more than 1mm bleed top and bottom).
In terms of width I normally print to 220mm wide.
It is also important that the paper extends beyond the wrap hence 240mm wide paper.

Wrap and print according to your normal settings. I recommend about 8 minutes or even 9 in this really cold snap. 24 mugs is 16-18 minutes for me in my oven.

The above I have found works the best for me in terms of no "blue hue" or gassing extending to the non print areas. If I put too much bleed or stop the paper short of the wrap I will get the blue hue.

I note you have tried the Thermoshrink film but it melted. This means your oven is too hot. Using the proper Thermoshrinkable film will not melt at the right temperature, but a few degrees higher and it will. You may want to bring the temp of the oven down a few degrees and give it another try. No need to waste hundreds of mugs until you get 1 printing perfectly.

Are you using the vacuum wraps from Best Subs. I've been looking at those and wondering whether I should spend the money on a vacuum oven.

No, I wouldn't use that as it means 1 mug every 8 minutes which in my humble opinion is not financially viable (I already have a vacuum oven and still will not use it for this). I used a thermoshrinkable film to hold the wrap in place.

[pisquee]

no, not thermoshrinkable film - tried palletwrap lol
will look it up
Bought in 100 of the green silicone wraps from China, but have since flogged them off on Ebay, they didn't hold the transfer tight enough all the way around the mug, so there were blurry/faded/white patches on some of the mugs.
We do do full bleed top to bottom, so probably have too much bleed to gass out.

[socialgiraffe]

no, not thermoshrinkable film - tried palletwrap lol

Yep, I can see how that would make a horrible mess

they didn't hold the transfer tight enough all the way around the mug, so there were blurry/faded/white patches on some of the mugs.

What is the diameter of your mugs? The wraps I get (from ebay) hold a LW mug perfectly.

We do do full bleed top to bottom, so probably have too much bleed to gass out.

I do full bleed mugs as well, you just need to reduce the amount of bleed you have. I only have 1mm top and bottom now which reduces the ink gassing to a minimum.