Scaling up DTF with enhanced properties

This transcription has been AI generated and therefore may have some inaccuracies.

Scaling up DTF with enhanced properties

Shahar Turgeman is the founder of STS Inks®, a Florida based company that develops and manufactures inks for the global specialty graphics marketplace. His twenty-year success as an innovator has demonstrated a rare combination of entrepreneurialism and chemical engineering.

He brings a unique background that includes science, sales and logistics, and has built his reputation by combining education and experience within software and hardware , chemistry and project management. During his tenure at STS, he has changed the industry application by application, while personally holding 11 patents for products that are currently manufactured in the US and widely sold internationally.

With his rare range of skills and talents, he provides the essential link between client needs and R&D to ensure exacting specifications for specific printers using multiple substrates in a highly competitive global environment.

Speaker 1: WTiN
Speaker 2: Shahar Turgeman

Speaker 1
Hello everyone and welcome back to innovate direct to film printing with event partners Inc bank and STS Inks, and sponsors Felix Schoeller and Hangzhou Hydrotech. I'm your host, Madelaine Thomas, Head of Content here at the World Textile Information Network. If you missed our first session of the day, farmhands, your Hydrotech then you can view it on demand via the event website. And that's with all of you, the sessions will be available until 17th of May.

Our next session comes from our event partner STS Inks, a leading manufacturer, specializing in high quality inks and digital inkjet technology. The company's founder Shahar Turgeman will discuss how we can scale direct to film printing with enhanced properties. STS Inks is a Florida US-based company that develops and manufactures in Fall global speciality graphics marketplace. He has 20 year success as an innovator has demonstrated a rare combination of entrepreneurism and chemical engineering. So it gives me great pleasure to welcome to her. Thank you for joining us.

Speaker 2
Good afternoon, everybody.

Speaker 1
Thank you. Thanks for having no problem. So as usual to our audience, if you have any questions, then please use the q&a box provided and I will present them to Shahar after his presentation. So over to you Shaha.

Have you have you'd like to share your presentation? 

Speaker 2
Sure. Okay, so thank you for joining us today.

My name is Shahar Turgeman and co founder of STS Inks, so in the industry for over 20 years in digital inkjet. And we only focus on digital inkjet. CSS. So start the presentation.

So STS, founded in 1999.

In 2005, we we opened the base with the US we started in New York, we then moved to Boca Raton, Florida 2013 We

we build our own

building that's capable to 60,000 square feet, warehousing and manufacturing

and we have a global distribution all over the world

cover 150 countries if we have to sell to location as well in Europe and South America, I will move as fast as I can you know as far as digital editions The production public property and then

and then we move to technical and technical aspects here. So sorry I push it that fast. We have a lot of to do to talk about the DTF technology.

So we do we do a custom formulation based on the PMs colo or special project or any substrate is for difficulty to bring this far as water base solid base you the application so on in from the scanning technology all the way to single pass as well we doing private label private label for many OEM companies.

As far as testing, testing for the end, we do the your allergies study as far as the viscosity measurements that surface tension, dynamic surface tension pH,

the loss of the solid content density, specific gravity dissolved in oxygen level and we will discuss a lot of dissolved oxygen level during the DPF agent application

conductivity white writing glows reader

contact Angel particle size analyzer with DLs and the microscope and an analyzer excels

at meter up these says sector by

sector to check the LED value density. We do have as well as testing as far as Atlas vs. For washing test that we're going to discuss that a little bit more about it.

Robin,

Robin the President and President better and like my fastness as far as Zeeland test and the Flashpoint test as well.

As we design it for many different application as far as being handled as far as a Kyocera lipo Panasonic Epsons are Fuji devil had MPs are a disposable Epson

we do hold over 5000 different formulation from from day to day bass glycol either

up or bass up and water bass a lot of water bass and as far as production for the for aqueous pigment in the pigment and dye based ink the pigment is a we grind the pigment the dye the dye base is basically dissolved to water

We do manufacture as well as edible in direct to any substrate a for packaging industry

textile as far as dye sublimation DTG DTF

and so on. So, we'll start with the big this is the production for the company started the DTF technology

ETF will the industry for the DTS already for four and a half years close to five years right now and from the beginning it was a lot of challenge you know as far as Okay, let's get the the right formulation for the

as far as what what is the best TPU in the industry, film and so on. So, in the beginning, it was a lot of challenge as well as for the equipment not just for the consumable parts as well as for the for work for the equipment.

If three years ago, we partnered with what about three three and a half years ago, we partner with the with some large, large OEM company mainly Japanese company and we asked them to build the last in the sheet a printer that is stable and reliable in the industry.

So we start with the with a small baby machine, the baby machine is there six to eight the model is the security as a start and we have 100 of those machines so in the industry

and then we'll move to the double head machines that is a larger than the 1682 D machine with the DX seven technology and now we are in the third generation that is the X PE nine to fall a night for that is we're going to start later on about the technology behind the equipment. So, what is direct film that film is a technique development team designed to the film we can be film or paper PT film or paper and

within CMYK or the white, we can also predict any spot below as far as orange green fluorescent.

Fluorescent inspires being yellow and cyan.

Then we

then we apply the TPU the TPU

execute it's is this helped to adhesion to the garment. Sorry the garment can be very different garment as far as nylon cotton polyester, blend, a lycra and so on.

Speaker 2
We will discuss a little bit a little bit more about the ink and dissolve a Drs. Okay regarding for for industry or injured application, it's very important especially when you're waiting in high speed

dissolved oxygen and right now most of the machine that is open sales system is not the gas. So, basically what you can see over here the non because if you will see a lot of overspray overspray with the head teller of the head body overheat the head. So, all our aid that is in pouches is actually is a desert is the does is filter last chance and then we asked to attach So, the headlight will be

almost double or triple as the normal hair as well as the as well as a bending or misfiring at the end blockage of the head okay.

So, we can see here a graph

the flow rate between the pressure drop the pressure, the pressure drop there between the D gas and non because in the oxygen level

and the flow and the level of the battery we removed the oxygen level. So, usually the

usually under gassing is about a PPM and we're including reduce the the oxygen level in the ink all the way down to two PPM okay maybe maybe the minimum is two PPM based on the density of the

so then then then the advantage on the gas for the gassing versus the bulk since then in is the maintenance and cleaning. So when you want actual life okay and you need to stop the machine and the data we call it the downtime during the training during maintenance cleaning while you're printing the frequency

the the maintenance is regularly you need to do cleaning and all in with a cleaning is actually more cleaning you're doing you actually damage the hand it's you shortage them more often. So, if your machine setup every 45 minutes cleaning or every one hour cleaning you probably going to damage the head faster as the level of lifetime the aim should be flow smoothly to the head to the damper and without any forcing to fill up with down all the sub time

there is spillage you know and refilling is continuously to watch in case you have production for 2030 machining in one hole and if you try to do production it's very hard to to make sure all the in tank is filled to the level and sometime you know you forget to fill the tank in the appropriate way a UA getting air in the line and then again is a downtime can be downtown for a couple hours and to fill the line or extract their book live the life

changing bio box system and box system and darker is more open when you're using a box system versus cartridges.

The printer will not stop in cases is it's empty. So when you using the cartridges, the machine basically will stop and trigger the machine to say hey, I'm empty slot number six or seven or eight and you need to read contrary you need to change the cartridges and the smooth operation.

So sdse SPS why in technology

so as you can see over here, you know this is the particle size this is the surface energy of the THQ and you can see what we need to make sure is basically we have enough

enough space between pigment to pigment and and basically we don't get any aggregation between payment. So, the TI two regardless and each ti two in the industry is a heavy pigment is not like you know inorganic pigment is subtle point here as the CMYK and we always need to agitate the pain to disperse to disperse the pigment.

The question is when you shake it was theory how how soon it will be dispersed as a normal

and it's a smaller particle size we can get.

It's for the DDA publication is about 200 to 280 to 320 Nano. If it's a larger 800 Nano, you go in to see a climbing and subtle bricklayer. And

if it's the particle size is way too low, you know getting the opacity. So, we find out the best, the best

the best particle size with blinding the pigment is on the DPT is about

250 to 320 No more than that.

So as you can see, when we are

when we follow when we formulate our aim,

we need to get in in the highest capacity as possible. Okay, and this is a showcase in that what we generally do is jetting straight is normally spiring a you know recently and in those ones you don't paddling

on the PE film

now in our way technology, you're getting extended the dekap time outstanding opacity of 0.06 density so this is

equivalent to a sales strain. It's a very wide capacity, very high density have wide capacity, a formula to do maximum adhesion and colorfastness. And we did we do a lot of testing and then watch the fastness in our in the DTF application and we will in the next couple slides we will discuss about what to do

the Inc our H A PS has on every solution is free and we do have a formulation with the either glycol free

we'll discuss right now we discussed about the dye migration polyester so in our industry

we a lot of customers are using a polyester material. So there's a lot of dye dye polyester

companies doing different technology

for Diamond raishin so we the way we do it is basically before we before we set up our

selling in the press in the heat press we take a fabric piece of public air of piece of the same shirt we press it between seven to 15 It's seven to 12 second at a low temperature is about 200 reading the ad

Fahrenheit and then we can see we get the in cough better we can see if it's any diamond racial dark o'clock did we see any dye migration so we can load the the

the heat he time or the or the here okay or the temperature.

The second thing is to make sure you're using the correct view in the white the white capacity in the white capacity. So the TPU is very important on the data migration it's all based on the grain sites. So it's a lot of TPU that is a very fine TPU between 50 to 80 Nano and some of them is between 120 to 80 days. So you know that none of Michael

and some of them is between between 120 to 180 micron and then is from 180 to 270. Again, if you use it

if you use a TPU that's is a very, very high

very loud we know about 250 micron you will have an issue with the Henfield.

So we find out between 140 to 180 micron This is the best way but again, the white opacity it's a lot. It's a lot to do with him so make sure when you

press on polyester make sure you have a very good cover or for the weiderpass

they set the heat press base on the on production of the polyester. Always a need to test the heat before I

applied it to the fabric or the fabric. In cotton. We didn't see any diamond operation

And, or any issue with many different application as well as nylon material, nylon material

can be

all the way down. So if you any kind of customer pending on the,

on the example umbrella, okay, the three second place

and 220 Celsius, and he wouldn't release it by himself.

Right, so we talk a little bit about the lead software and what we see in the industry as far as the scale up.

So it's a lot of new software in the industry and a lot, a lot of companies coming into the industry, come to the industry and try to understand the DTF market.

So what is important to see all the LEAP software, when you seal up the MS colo budget to make sure that that's always you're getting the same consistency point between between job to job or you printed, to their production and then another two months production.

So it's a way to basically do a spot call or PMS, PMS color collection, hot folder. So we do have the some customer that printing 20 to 25,000 file a day. So you need to make sure that say the roof software capable to hold that volume of five

barcode barcode is very important

with the order number so it will be easy for you to apply when you when you print and when you scan the order. And then when you apply to when you apply for to the government or the order in order number.

What file we should we should use a raster file or vector file that is very important.

We refer to a US A both of them can apply and do a margin call.

We we we highly recommend to use a file that has a PMS colo that's been a sparkle or change that will be easier for consistency printing and colo accuracy.

Then a job for the cutter. As you scale up in production, you can when you have 2030 machines in one location.

It's very hard to cut the bat by hand. So is it a lot of solution. For targeting device make sure the device is a flatbed device and not all device like a small carry vital that one is not working for long run.

The easy way to do the cutting is basically the heart when you point the job, the job go to the heart folder, include the cut the cut file, QR code will read the file based on the file and then basically will cut the media as simple as that make sure the RIP software that you select you have the printable do that.

As far as a smarty smart name, file rotation mean mode number of kopien enter in cetera

is a lot of LEAP software company right now. You can select that habit, tenable 221 Smart Lane file, that's mean if you have an order number two example if you have a file name called 123 Or is your order is 123. You can you can add

in the name of the file you can n number of people you want in in the file. So you don't need to open the file send seven code is seven file is 740 can be everything automated or automated. In in the name of the file includes rotation, print mode, number of bogey and order number. So everything can be automation with not without any human touch.

Setup is set up a spotlight a lot of the

of our existing customer had in the past three, four years ago had issue with the white power can do the white layer and a lot of company coming from the salesman application. Some customer has probably about 50 60,000 different hours a different name job to a change and it's very hard to change each file each individual file. So it's a way to set up a spotlight based on the sale screen application. So

A lot of customers are using.

Using two example as the out is the blue is the white two example or it can be a purple and any follow this choose 1015 years ago to select this spot Polo. So we can change we basically can take the spot there or what they've selected in the past and change it to to a spot to spot white. So this is the RIP software will do it automatically without basically any changes

on the DPF application as well when you select the right the correct billing software,

it's important there that they have the functionality for 50% 50% on their black. So on the DTF application we when is the very dark area or to example black, we don't need a lot of opacity. Okay, so you can you basically can do automatically everything anytime you put in black, the sleep software will put 50% of the setting of the white and what is a what is a colo can do 80% And when is it real white writing it through white writing he will highlight to 100% or two 90% As long as not actually drinking from the film and an oversaturation. So this is all the point before you select your web software and make sure you you have all the knowledge

to understand that, that if you go if you go your company in the next level and you adding more and more machine, you have all that ability, ability to learn on the lips of

at least at this point, we're going to have some

open discussion.

I would like to

do answer a couple is not in the presentation. But we can go

point by point. And then explain a little bit about the open discussion.

So

hello

Speaker 1
Shahar sorry, you ready for the q&a? Did you have my presentation?

Speaker 2
No, we'd like to talk a little bit about the scale up on the open discussion a

little bit about a little bit about anything and then the q&a will be in the end and hopefully I will answer a couple of them. That's fine currently and let you carry on. Sorry about that.

Okay, so developers

develop a digital network we can analyze going forward going forward. Basically it's it's a lot of development around the DTF market we see a lot of glow in the market, a lot of screen companies start to move to the DPF application

so the question is how are we going to grow our business from one machine to machine and 20 machine or 30 machines when you go to production

it's a lot to do with with the women a lot to do with the hardware sometimes you need to make sure that you select the right outlet it's not all about it's not about just the consumable consumables what parts of the game that allowed a lot of time to do with it

with equipment as far as device length for example everything differently so how I can match between printer and meeting printer

or where other example to machine to head technology.

So is a way to basically to talk to each other you know to talk to each other with between the whole file between the poor file between device laying and make sure that the spark follow independent model will be the same as

as far as consistency and the same color.

As far as the

DPF the DPF a

business, it's a it can be walking for many different

application and customer can be as small as small Mom, mom and pop shop all the way to allow production and to do 25 To live in 50,000 plays a day based on the equipment and based on the number of machines they could

Speaker 2
The comparison side by side the comparison between screen versus the digital printing, digital screen and the sale screen application.

Write down the digital application with the dkfp become closer, closer and closer to the superior application. It's even lighter. In some applications, some poverty it's even lighter than then the silkscreen even better in some fabric.

Testing color matters. So

when you when you start to move to the DTM publication, we saw the Polo and how close the DTF can get matched to existing technology as far as silkscreen or digital or DTG. The DTF actually have a much more gamut. So we can go we can get

our gumball basically, it's larger than the Sales screen

and we can create any PMS codal very close to every PMS color and feeling it's very Henfield it's very important as far as gracias gradually smooth so etc. wide coverage and

lay down. So

the white coverage in the DDF application it's very important, especially when it comes in when you transfer to polyester material or or hoodies. That is a blend.

The white garbage can be a little bit challenge as far as form for Henfield all the way to wash it really

washed is that we're a wash and testing the ability.

How

how did the board acted on by washing?

We ran a test we'll talk about in the next slide about the women in testing. So the question is yes, if the answer is yes is hauling

over 50 washes, we know any major cracking or any wear

and tear such ability and flexibility it's really very nice within DTF it's actually some application it's better than silkscreen,

especially in the DTG you will not see this

clocking

the PDF application to be printed on the on the 100%

polyester tribal blend on a percent polyester is the artisan cotton.

The most is that is the most important for the DTF application.

We learned the here SDS we want to get the standard deadlift AGT a TC 61 program to a that's a that is 120 degree Fahrenheit Washtech temperature

we take a 50 stainless steel bowl

we put it in canister 400 450 milliliter

chamber and we wash it for 45 minutes.

Every 45 minutes will give us a five domestic

five the domestic was worse than the one that brought you setting.

This is a standard for FAS G is a approval Inc for application for this as far as durability for silicone and plaster saw for that Asian for

achieve their durability. And also they

also the scratch resistant as well.

The testing this is the testing machine that we're using we're using we're using the Atlas test machine that give us a very quick result. So basically in seven, seven to eight hour we will do 50 Washing

50 washing this is the canister that we're using. So we take a full input fabric. We put it in allistaire we put 50 stainless steel bowl and then we also testing the dye migration we have special fabric that we put inside to make sure that that migration is well on the fabric itself.

So hot kill hot peel versus cold peel and PT and paper

So

four and a half years ago, when we started, we all the industry was called Build the hot pill was a, it was not there yet. And

and it was the washability was the issue. So when you choose the Hatfields versus the Popeil, you need to make sure you watch afterwards we'll go into where to print the finishing. So if you want a matte finish or gloss finish, it's it's a lot to do with the film and the Henfield as well. It's it's a lot to do with the film

washability we still we saw some cases that's both had a call killed with different companies. Basically, they washability is that there is some some in and again, it's the same ink, same file, same thing, everything was really to start there because the film, the film, do a lot of washability.

And

the durability, a lot of a lot of

what you print on the oven and boiler on safety vest, you want to get durability, the durability

it's a lot to do with the field. We prefer the PT field versus to the paper for a couple of reasons. Reason number one is

it's easy to apply to the fabric because it's clear and the customer and the customer can see where you're placing.

This is number one number two, as far as the PT.

Today VT will give you better polo than the paper we're going to get we testing many different types of company, paper transfer company, they will give you better washability better paying feel and better durability.

I'm sure there's a lot of company going to work on the paper on the future, but I'm not sure how you can do it as a transparents.

We'll discuss a little bit about the hardware. So this is our newest equipment we have in the industry. This is the Exedy 94 We intend to do so that they I say we can group and we could go we released the previous version

got the big reward by BL y for the 6092 D version.

As far as the this is the third generation machine.

The Joe Johnson machine has a lot of a changing, it's a lot of changing and specific for a four

four DTF application. So we saw the SPD nine to four we take the machine form from scratch and build it designed for the DPF application and that taking a machine and converting it to form from eco solvent or from dye sublimation to the detailed publication.

As far as the technology of the nine to fo DTF

it's a it's the art of fine print and I screen

I screen is the way that the jetting between passes

is the waveform between passes and knows allele selected we will be a little bit more details about it in the next slide. And basically the machine is doing everything automatic. So as far as the as far as the ink circulation as far as

every eight hour will it will wake up and do the maintenance automatically wiping

cleaning the head in the bottom auto auto pay the lineman auto beach paper feed adjustment and again the machine is made in Japan.

The aquifer technology printhead is it's the tolerance between

the tolerance as far as environment is between 65 Fahrenheit all the way to 8080 Fahrenheit we ready for any too far light.

As far as humidity, you can go all the way low to 30 all the way up to 6060 biobay humidity, we guarantee that it's going to be between 66 to 77 and the humidity level and between 40 to 55. But again, versus do the other DX seven machining the industry for Japanese made that is the biggest art of fine technology with a premium is the biggest dollars you can get as far as the environment and

Super, super fast we double head we can get about 12 square meters an hour in production mode, that's a that is about 138 square feet an hour. And linear feet linear feet is about 198 linear feet an hour, as well, you know, basically alone will finish about four and a half hour full work, the full hole is 24 inch by 328 feet, or 60 centimeter by 100 meter in Florida half hour. If you go to high quality mode, probably about five and a half hours.

So the nozzle earlier selected,

one of the parts we saw in the in the DTF application is the white light, how we can get the white head to use the Vitalis is as much as we can. So at this point, we're learning the head, we're learning the heading only for channel with 332 nozzles, we have nozzle area selected. So in cases, we have any nozzle blockage, we can move to other to other normal. I don't know the area. And again, this is everything done by the operator you will paint

no the layer selected, you can use the best power anything get the full channel and basically back to back to the board actually in four to five minutes.

Speaker 1
You're gonna have to wrap it up. Now you have close to the end of the presentation. Just we do have some audience questions and We're nearly out of 12 we are out of time. So I will try and get some audience questions and if that's all right, yeah, go ahead. Okay.

Speaker 2
Did you want to finish this slide before? Yeah. Yeah, so I want to say quickly just went over to low and that's it. I want to do it quick. So the advantage of the night to forehead technology is be directional. So when you put the image you don't want to show any wires under the CoLo

so the machine has the outdoor air alignment for bi directional as well as the petal feeder just everything that automatically you don't need to go and look at the loop move to the left or to the right it doesn't it doesn't it doesn't automatically and the new shaker technology that estem is is is fantastic machine that is basically as a built in air filter and that is a permanent filter with the with the 15 different Sharples filter, it's filtration, but we can get more information. If you guys want to know a little bit more about our shaker, we can we can email to us and we can answer any question.

Okay, so

Speaker 1
I said okay, sorry to have to wish you that at the end. I just didn't want to leave

any audience questions unanswered? I mean, we will have to we've had a few but I just want to get some answered if we can. But thank you for that presentation. And for all the detail there as well. Just a quick question on the software and that you mentioned the RIP software does that software need to be configured just for direct to film printing? Or can you kind of use an an out of the box solution that you would use for DTG off a roll to roll for example. You can use the software for Digi arrow tool so you can have all the all the all the machine connected one to one software that is

okay. And how's the data F market presented new sales opportunities to yourself and other manufacturers manufacturers given that resellers are now building and selling their own D to F printers

Speaker 2
market grow for the DPF application is it's gone a lot you know in our industry has helped a lot to our company we go whoo yo really impressive. I cannot say the number but we do a lot for the nuclear publication. We see the DTF a markets become strong in the industry and stronger and stronger even you know as we go we moving a lot of product a lot of

film you know the equipment become better everything become better. So that's the time that a lot of large company large production company moving to that industry for the weekend.

Speaker 1
And in the US market in particular, what kind of levels of growth are you seeing there?

Speaker 2
In US market we see a lot of good

barley about 70 to 60

to 70% a year for the DDF application, what I like to see that say in our application near SDS, we we are not competing with the small DTF.

So, with the small DTG model, we are trying to close it to the, to the salestone application, how we can compete with the sealskin application to have a mass production and not to just play on demand.

So, demand is very big in in us,

as I say some companies spending,

you know, 1000s of 1000 shirts a day, and it's all print on demand. So we seen the growth is pretty

Speaker 1
interesting and interesting to see how those kinds of business models are changing as DTF grows as well. Well, thank you so much, and thank you to our audience as well. And we did try to get through some of your questions. I'm sorry, we couldn't get through all of them. But you can. Astra has said Do feel free to contact him or us or we can contact him for you, if you have any other questions you'd like answering.

So please join us at 2pm UTC for our Fireside Chat titled Are we witnessing a paradigm shift in inkjet technology development, where we will assess the opportunity within DTF for third party consumables and that shifting market? This discussion will be between WTI and digital textile lead Joe link and industry expert experts and product and marketing manager at Sun chemical, Dr. Sam and Declan so we look forward to seeing you all then in just over 10 minutes time.