Is it bad to leave a mug press on say 5 mins between mugs?

[Greensleeves]

Bought a mug press and sometimes noticed verticle brown line on my mugs. I do see the blanlet has changed to a darker colour at 2 points. But i was told if the paper on the mugs gets creased it causes this problem. Is this true?

[bms]

Is there a crease in the blanket? Normally you should cut the paper so that it is flat on the bottom of the mug and might stick up a little over the top of the mug. The paper shouldn't crease over the face of the mug unless there is a crease in the heat blanket or the mug isn't straight. Can you post a pic of the problem?

[frizbee]

When you say brown lines, do you mean where the you would expect to see a dark coloured printed area. This could be burnt ink and may just mean you need to drop your temperature a bit, try 5 deg at a time.

Most manufacturers say you can leave on mug presses that have an idle temp set for a while, from experience we are sure the longer you leave the press without a mug in it the shorter the life of the wrap and we now never leave a mug press empty.

David

[Greensleeves]

I think i have solved the problem for now. I took a few seconds of the time the mug is left in the press and where i had a tinge of pink in my pictures has gone. I always turn the press off if there is no mug in it now.

[John G]

I have a spare mug handy and when i'm not pressing, or inbetween presses on a run of mugs, I put this one into the press. I use the same mug all the time, its gone a bit brown now and would be unusable but I was told that the presses are never to be left without a mug in.

Cheers John

[frizbee]

Leaving a mug in the press is ok as long as you don't have a press with an idle temp, becasue as soon as you put in the mug the timing/heating process starts again. This process is more suited for the chinese presses that have a manual timer, which should haev a mug in while the initial heating is done.

Mug Presses like the DF range and the ones from adkins are not deisgned to be left with scrap mugs in them. Both of these types heat up in less than a minute so there is no need to leave them on and of course you are just wasting electrcity.

If you think the other way, say you beleive you can get 1000 mugs out of a wrap before it needs replacing, if a mug takes 3 minutues to print, then 50 hours of idle time = one worn out wrap.

[John G]

Yes - mine is a chinese press so thats why I leave a mug in.

Cheers John