Dyesub Equipment

To get into dyesub, I recommend you offer 10'-wide prints with no seams. Right there you are looking at spending about $120,000 for the printer and $80,000 for the sublimator. So, before you find a person that can run a sewing machine, you are into the system for $200,000. And to find this equipment in the used market is very difficult because the difficulty of running a 10'-wide dyesub machine is a 9 out of 10. So if you purchase a used machine, you might be getting another person’s headache.

 

Here is a 8’ x 8’ dyesub fabric single piece being used for a trade show booth popup display.

Running a print into a dyesub machine.

Dyesub Process

In the process of printing a dyesub print, you have two choices: print to a bond paper as a mirror image or print directly to the fabric. If you print to the paper, you have the issues of cockeling paper—this is where the paper puckers due to the amount of ink. Solid black is most problematic. The image is the best quality and the sharpest print with the paper method, but the paper can walk and the fabric can get tiger striping lines during the process. Tiger striping is vertical lines of faded image due to the fabric being pulled unevenly through the sublimator, this is a result in most cases of shrinking fabric, not the machine or people operating the system. This is a problem that has haunted us for more than 15 years. If you print directly to the fabric, the tiger striping, and walking issues basically go away, but you still have the same shrinkage. 

 

When you print to the fabric directly, the image is not as crisp and the color quality, some say, is not as good. I feel that for most grand-format images, the printing directly to the fabric is fine as long as they do not get to see the same image done the paper way, then they will always pick the paper process. Regardless of the method of placing the dyesub dye (it is not an ink, it is a dye) on the paper or directly to the fabric, you still must run the print through the sublimator to sublimate the image into the fabric. When you print directly you must use the beaver paper (tissue paper) to protect the belt from being stained and to give the residue from the sublimation process some place to go. The sublimator runs at 400 degrees and a speed of around 24" a minute. As the printer, I want to move to print to fabric and then sublimate it. This cuts down on errors, creates less waste, and allows faster production. I will tell you that to get a 126"-wide piece of fabric in a printer and not have issues with head strikes, walking, etc., is not realistic. Plus, I find the fabric that I can direct print dyesub to is more expensive than the standard fabric. 

 

Direct Print Options

The most common direct print option is solvent printing on coated fabric. Today, the coated fabrics are excellent, the print quality is so close to dyesub that very few people can tell the difference from 4' away. Plus, with a coated product you can print on just about any fabric, as dyesub can only work with polyester material. So what is the gotcha? 

 

Sheer dyesub double sided graphics, all grand format.

Smell—If you use hot solvent ink to print your image because you want the image to be as bright as possible, then you will have that hot solvent ink smell to deal with for a while. I did a show with a famous radio person where we printed the table tops, fronts and stage graphics. Due to the one-day event, the cost was so much better to just print them and throw them away. The graphics were finalized two days before the event. We printed all day and set up the night before. The show was at 5 a.m. and the people sitting at the table complained a lot about the smell. From that day forward we could not use these direct print fabrics again for this client. Had I printed on an eco-solvent printer, the smell would not have been an issue. Today you also have the UV-curable ink that is gaining great success in the market printing on both coated and uncoated fabric. I also have used this for graphics. Again, for most of my jobs this solution is fine, but not as durable as the dyesub method.

 

Durability—I find the durability of the direct printed fabric is not as good as the dyesub. You must look at the application to determine if durability will be a concern. In a window or hanging from a ceiling, the issue of durability will not be a concern. Being used as a table cloth, stage graphics, roll-up banner stands, etc., then you could have issues. I do not find the ink comes off, but I do find it gets scratch marks and in a few cases a look like an ink crack (more likely the coating did not hold up). Plus, if you plan on washing the fabric, you could be in for a surprise if you direct print it. 

 

Tension fabric dyesub stretched on a frame and hung as a backlit display.

Cost—The fabric is more expensive when coated, in many cases more than 30 percent. Now is 30 percent a lot? No, because if you were paying $.30 per sq. ft. for fabric and you now have to pay $.40 per sq. ft. (most of the coated fabrics I purchase cost me around $.55 per sq. ft.) but you do not have to pay $4,000 a month for a system, well you are way ahead. Plus, you still have to purchase the paper, and it costs about $.10 per sq. ft. Solvent ink printers at 10' wide cost around $120,000—many people go to the shows and see an 8' printer and feel this is just as good. Wrong. Fabric demand is either 42" wide or 120" wide. There is very little demand for 8' wide unless all you do is trade show booths. My clients want 16'-wide dyesub for stages, concerts, trade show displays, retail displays, indoor banners for malls, and large retail stores. This is big money. 

 

The Touch of Fabric—How does the fabric feel for direct print? Not as nice as dyesub. The coating makes the fabric stiffer, not as soft and not as nice to handle. I like fabric to flow, to look natural, and when my clients touch the dyesub fabric they are sold. When I give them a piece of direct-printed fabric, they are less interested even for less money. The problem is that I cannot give them direct print for half the money because I would not be profitable, so I can only offer the direct print fabric for about 20 percent less and they still are less interested.

 

Choices—The one problem with direct print fabric is that you do not have that many choices of material. Is this a real issue? Not really because the highest-demand fabrics for dyesub are the ones they coated. But still you need to be aware of the limits. Plus, you will find that only some of the coated fabrics print well; most I tested were less than satisfactory for me.

 

Narrow panels put together to make up a conference area at the show.

Finishing—Regardless of your choice, you must invest in a finishing area. You will need a number of large tables, a few commercial-grade double- and single-needle sewing machines, and a real good stitching person.

 

Now for the return on investment. Let me give you two models—one is a 10'-wide solvent ink jet solution with a direct print fabric; and the other a dyesub system. Let’s assume you can sell the exact same volume each day—I find this hard to believe you could, but let’s go with it.

 

System 1—A 10'-wide hot solvent printer costs around $120,000. Coated fabric has an average cost of $.50 per sq. ft. Because these prints are not as high quality as dyesub, I have an average sell price per sq. ft. of $4.

 

System II—A 10'-wide converted hot solvent printer to run dyesub dyes costs around $120,000. The sublimator is $80,000. The fabric cost is $.30 plus $.10 for paper, with an average ink cost of $.10 more per sq. ft. for the dyesub inks. So as you can see the cost to run both these machines is the same for cost of goods. My average sell price for dyesub prints is $5.50 per sq. ft.

 

System 1—Monthly Cost $2,400, Cost of Goods (C.O.G.) $.50 per sq. ft., Sell price $4.00.

 

System II—Monthly Cost $4,000, Cost of Goods (C.O.G.) $.50 per sq. ft., Sell price $5.50.

 

The goal in any printing business is to have the printer run for four hours a day. And to get more than four hours a day is difficult. If you take the above numbers, you will see that just over one hour a day of printing more than covers the cost of the dyesub system.

 

As in all cases you should do your homework before you purchase either of these solutions. There is no question that dyesub is one of the more difficult processes in the digital printing world. The good side is that it is one of the most profitable decisions you could make!

 

Good luck, be smart with your money, and I will see you on the show floor!