Hello Everybody, help and opinion needed please.

[Boingti]

Hello everyone, My name is Craig and for the last 10 years I've been running a Fine Art reproduction business. Over the last few weeks a few of my customers have been asking me about sublimation products for their artwork (mugs, mouse mats, jigsaws etc) so I'm taking the plunge and getting the gear in to do it myself rather than order it out. I have done a fair bit of research on this forum and others and this week I'm ordering the hardware I chatted to Chris at Subliblanks today (very helpful gentleman) and placed the order for the heat press

I'm getting

Dino Galaxy DP100 Heat press (being delivered Wednesday
Dino Galaxy Mug press Pro (have to wait for stock)
Sawgrass Virtuoso SG800 (with big carts)
Graphtec CE6000-40

I know I don't really need the Graphtec but I thought if I'm getting the heat press anyway I may as well get a tidy cutter so I can also dip my toes in the T-shirt market as well

I've paid for the premium membership (seems stupid not too) and I may be using Listawoods to get the printer, the most annoying thing is that I just sold an Epson 9900 and scrapped a working Epson 9600 just before deciding to go into the sublimation market!! To be honest though I really wanted to get away from Epson (I now use a Cannon IPF8400 as my main printer),Epson's customer service is beyond bad!

I have so many questions I need to ask but don't want to bog you all down in an introduction so I'll keep it to a few short ones for now.

If you can help me at all it would be most appreciated

1. Can anyone see a problem with the equipment I'm getting (any better suggestions?)
2. Does anyone know where I can get the best price for both the printer and cutter?

Cheers guys
All the best
Craig

[Justin]

Welcome to the forum Craig. Scrapped a working 9600? that's a hanging offence! Superb sublimation printer, mine is cracking!

I've no experience of Dino presses but for that sort of money I'd expect a decent quality wing away press, far more use. Auto open can cause ghosting problems unless it's a smooth operation. I see it has a drawer function which will be useful though.

Same with the mug press, new one on me. I'd be interested to see if these presses look as smart in the flesh, the images often make them look better but I may be wrong. Not sure on price of the mug press either?

I use Adkins Studio mug presses primarily and find them excellent. I have an Adkins swing away but since getting a Pressmech bag press I've not needed to use the Adkins at all.

I have a Graphtec 6000-60 which is a brilliant bit of kit but it's a big investment if your not sure how much you're going to use it. Xpres would be worth a call.

Justin
DSF Admin

[pisquee]

If you've used proper pro level printers for fine art printing, you may well be disappointed in using a 4 colour office printer to print work for sublimation. If you can get the 9600 back (or get another one) then that would be my choice (we run one for sublimation and a 7600 for art prints)

[scotty44]

I'm sure Paul (mod on here) had a Dino press! he may beable to give some feedback on it ...
The 6000-40 is something I keep looking at as a small cutter (but I already run 2 bigger ones this would be to replace my smaller desktop one)
Looked around and Greenstik have a good deal on them at the moment, only used them for some odd vinyl sheets when I had to test some printable vinyl (I spoke to Brett how was more than helpfull)
http://greenstikmaterials.co.uk/graphte ... s-plotters

[KathG]

Cannot give you an opinion of the heat and mug press, but I do have the SawGrass Virtuoso 800 and the Graphtec CE 6000-40. Both are both very good pieces of kit. The only complaint I have is I wish I had bought the CE6000-60. Mainly to get less wastage from the 500mm vinyl rolls.

[sas98kgj]

Hi Pisquee, Justin, Boingti, Could one of you please tell me the full model name of Epson 9600, 9900 and 7600? I am looking to buy a good printer(s) for sublimation and art prints. Did a internet search for the three, quite different type Epson printers -some large format and others not - came up.

[malfunction]

The Graphtec from greenstick is a bargain @ £674, If all your thinking of doing is t shirts it's a brilliant machine. I have the previous model (5000-40) and apart from the cutting width as mentioned above, it's perfect.
It has all the features of it's bigger brother (6000-60) for less than half the price.
Shame no one else wants one because greenstick are doing 10% a second item. You could have 2 of them for £1280 !!!

[pisquee]

Hi Pisquee, Justin, Boingti, Could one of you please tell me the full model name of Epson 9600, 9900 and 7600? I am looking to buy a good printer(s) for sublimation and art prints. Did a internet search for the three, quite different type Epson printers -some large format and others not - came up.

They are all Epson Stylus Pro wide format models ... so for example our main printer is an Epson Stylus Pro 9600, is 44" wide, printing onto 100 metre rolls of transfer paper, using InkTec Sublonova Pro inks in seven colours with bespoke ICC profiling per product types.

[sas98kgj]

They are all Epson Stylus Pro wide format models ... so for example our main printer is an Epson Stylus Pro 9600, is 44" wide, printing onto 100 metre rolls of transfer paper, using InkTec Sublonova Pro inks in seven colours with bespoke ICC profiling per product types.

Thanks very much pisquee.

[mrs maggot]

Welcome to the DSF Please feel free to introduce yourself and give us a little background info. to help get to know you better.

I'd appreciate it if you wouldn't post any questions within this intro. section, you should find a relevant section elsewhere for this. If not, please PM me and I'll point you in the right direction!

Justin
DSF Admin

made me laugh when i saw the first very detailed reply was from Justin himself - welcome to the forum by the way