Sign Printing

Greetings All,

I have a great oppurtunity! I could have a ton of business printing political/campaign signs and need to know the best process for getting this done. Do I want a standard rotary screen printer, or a press type printer? I won't be doing this full time and need to find the perfect application to produce quality signs in a somewhat timely fashion, without breaking the bank on the initial investment. Any suggestions? Thanks.

Greg hamrick's picture

Your not going to need a rotary printer to do political signs, but, if your client wants Tee's to go with those signs, then you'll need one. If your going to jump into it, may as well knock a couple birds in the head with a rock.
You can get away with just hinge clamps for signs. Mainly because you can only print one color at a time with signs. UV inks, or air-dry inks. Both can be found from (Tube Lite). The UV inks need UV light to cure. Not to worry though, just buy the bulbs and make a dryer.
The hinge clamps are about $20 bucks, you can find them at (Victory Factory), "they make the best screens". As far as your blanks for the signs, check out (Mum Power), they carry everything for signs. Even the clamps and inks.

Good Luck.

At the edge of dreams lay the far-flung ideals of true creation.

Thanks for the quick reply Greg. I was definately leaning towards the rotary for the added bonus of offering tee's as well. If I was to have a 4 arm rotary, than I could start 4 signs at once, do the one color, dry, than do the second color on the 4, would that be the procedure? Thanks again, I'm sure I'll have many more questions.

Greg hamrick's picture

That would do the trick. Four is better than one. But if your going to go that far, why not go for a six color printer. Many a time you'll be faced with printing more than four colors on tees and then what?
The only draw back, or not, is that you'll need more equipment to get the jobs done. And feel free to ask all the questions you want...me or someone else here will be glad to offer advise from experience.

At the edge of dreams lay the far-flung ideals of true creation.

Thanks for the generosity. Here's the situation: I work a full-time job at a newspaper and a friend I work with is in to politics big time and has connections. He knows of several folks who will be running for office in the next year or so and are in need of a local union printer. If I can get the operation going, I'll be guaranteed a lot of business printing signs. Generally, all of the signs will be two color, outdoor campaign signs. Here's a few more questions:
What are your suggestions as far as brand for a screen printer, any I should stay away from?
What would be the best inks to use for outdoor stuff?
What type of screens are the best?
Most of the printers I've found, mention "shirts per hour", should I expect signs to take the same amount of time, or are they easier or harder than shirts?

Thanks again for your help, and I hate to sound like a newbie rookie, but that's what I am.

Greg hamrick's picture

Sounds like you have the business to get up and running. And don't worry about sounding like a rookie, I started printing back in 81'. Have printed about everything and I'm still learning.
The things to look for in a printer is good registration and miro-adjustments. Without em' your not going to be able to hold tightly butted colors together. However, they aren't going to help much when printing signs. The dry time of the inks will slow you down to a snails pace.
It's better to make a custom board to hold the signs and print them all one color at a time. The custom board should be marked with the first signs outline so that each sign that follows can be placed in that exact position. On the exposure unit, fix registration marks to hold the artwork and the screens at the same position so that little registration is needed to realign the signs screens for the next color. It also helps to make the artworks colors slightly overlap each other so that any misalignment should not be noticable.
That sort of thing you need not worry about when printing shirts, since they are held down with adhesive spray and the screens are all aligned before you start printing. Plus, you will be using a flash dryer between colors to flash dry the plasisol inks and you can have all that speed. Believe it or not, printing signs one color at a time is just as fast as printing shirts all colors at a time.
As for screens, use a 230 to 300 mesh count screen so that not too much ink flows through and spreads out beyond the image area. "VictoryFactory.com" has been making screens for me for years and I have no complaints.
For anything that has to do with signs, check out "mumpowersignsupply.com". They have any kind of paint, inks, blanks and way too many things to mention.

Hope this helps...........

.

At the edge of dreams lay the far-flung ideals of true creation.

jr_sanford's picture

For signs, I use Nazdar® 9700 ink. It air dries in 15-20 minutes (room temperature) but you can force dry it 40 - 60 seconds at 90° - 150°. That's what I do on my conveyor dryer.

To set up, I put the positive film on a sign that I'm going to print. I then set up the multiple screens to that positive that I've secured (on the sign board) to the platten. I then use two pieces of sign material butted to the left and lower edge of the sign board to give me my placement (registration) of the sign material for each print.

Signs are a quick and easy way to make some fast money!

J.R.

Cast aside your limitations;
And you shall be boundless!

printing signs is terrible. I hate it. The ink smells and you have to worry about a lot of factors. I don't know if you have play with the price when they place an order with you, but I go online when I get 100+ sign orders, and I just get quotes from some sign places online. I've gotten below $4 on signs that are full color both sides.

It might be worth it for you to check on that. And they are fast turnaround times.
I haven't had any problem with the quality either. I was amazed at the prices I found.