CALENDARED VINYL with MATTE OVERLAM for print & cut vehicle decals

[Chuck Taylor]

Check with your vinyl vendors, you probably won't have to buy a full roll, many sell select stuff by the foot/ yard...

I always use 3M IJ35mc for printed cut vehicle graphics and then overlam with the Arlon 3420 for UV protection and matte finish.

Been my go-to for almost a decade and as mentioned, the lam has very little shrinkage.

These also depend on your prints, the more ink density, the more possible shrinkage might occur as the way the vinyl has degraded from the ink, if using eco-solvent.

Eitherway, your situation of lam lifting from the vinyl, is the problem with having a good lam adhesive. The Arlon series is just hard to beat for price and quality. Oraguard (Orafol) can be a good equal or better or worse give or take, but it just costs more that it doesn't make a huge difference between them.

Interesting that you mention the ink density, that is something that I never thought of before. We always use Hexis for weeded decals, as it never peels up when we print edge to edge. This is a new one for me. I always clean everything thoroughly with an alcohol mix before installing. In 10+ years I have never seen a decal peel up like this either, but it happened on both their vehicles. Lesson learned, it's cast from now on or nothing I guess. Thanks for your feedback!

 

[Chuck Taylor]

It looks like your problem has more to do with the fact that it is mounted on glass, than with the material. Glass is a problem. Stickers/Decals often don't last a long time on glass. We always warn the customer that stickers on glass probably won't last as long as decals on painted metal. Nobody has complained, and customers seem to accept that explanation.

If you use a cast material or some of the high performance calendared, it's often not sticky enough to adhere to glass properly.

If you use calendared, with a calendared overlaminate, the edges often lift because of shrinkage.

Best bet, in my opinion, is to use any calendared or cast material with a sticky backing and a cast overlaminate. A 30" roll of cast matte shouldn't be too expensive and has a long shelf life.

Also, I recently was instructed that 3M IJ40 is both sticky and high performance, so this might be a good way to go. Actually, we're going to try it on our next inventory cycle.

At any rate, we've had good success with any sticky calendared and a cast overlaminate on glass.

It was actually mounted onto metal on the back of their truck. Never in 10+ years has this happened to us, but I guess my luck ran out on this job. Thankfully it's only 6 small decals we need to replace! Thanks for your feedback and suggestions though... much appreciated.

 

[Chuck Taylor]

First, using calendared media instead of cast means that you get to save, quite literally, a few cents. Not worth it. Then, after looking at your photo, I've never before seen properly installed laminate lift off the media like this. This would lead one to believe that it wasn't properly installed. I assume that this is just a crappy photo and the gray is really unprinted white and not a full bleed. If the latter then that has a host of problems as well. As for cutting the laminate larger than the decal, it requires two passes through your plotter as well as two weeding sessions and makes for an interesting, to say the least, job. Moreover, why do you expect the laminate to be any sturier than the media?

We cleaned the vehicles thoroughly with an alcohol mix and they were installed in a heated garage that was above 10 C, as recommended. We always allow our prints to degas a minimum or 24 hours before laminating too. I have never had this happen in the 10+ years we've been doing this, so I was shocked when they brought it to my attention. I went and saw them on Friday and took a better picture. Thankfully it's just a few small pieces that need to be replaced on each vehicle, but it never feels good to find out something you've done didn't hold up, as reputation is so important and no one wants to have this happen. We always strive to use the correct materials for the job, but as we've had great success with doing print, cut and lam decals using the Hexis medium, we thought we'd be okay to use it on this project as well. I guess this was the job that was going to bite us in the butt is all... lesson learned!

 

[Chuck Taylor]

The shrinkage in your picture doesn't look normal, not even for a calendared vinyl, and certainly not for a rather small sticker on an almost flat surface.
How do you apply the laminate?
Is it possible that you stretch the laminate when you apply it, and that it simply shrinks back to "normal" again?

We allow the print to degas for a minimum of 24 hours and then apply the over lam with rollers (we have a Royal Sovereign wide format cold laminator). Area was thoroughly cleaned with an alcohol mix and installation was done indoors at +10C as recommended.