Cast or Calendared?

[Goatshaver]

I often do stickers with RTapes vinylEFX metallic material. It's a royal pain in the a** but a lot of people love the shiny stuff. However I find it does curl up a bit and I know it has limitations for solvent printing, like leaving 6mm clear of any cuts to prevent curling.

Now even with doing that I still stuff that will curl eventually but I think it's just the laminate shrinking up a little.

Would a cast overlam possibly mitigate this? and if so what is a decent cheaper cast overlam that I can look into trying?

 

[Christian @ 2CT Media]

Yes, it would. The Cast laminate will have little to no shrink, where calendared would. You can even look into 3M 8048 non-PVC for an even lower price and better than cast performance in the realm you are working in.

 

[GAC05]

Ping Bigfish and see what laminate he has to offer.

 

[Johnny Best]

Arlon has good cast laminates.

 

[Hero Signs]

we leave .25in of white around the edges so they do not curl on calandered vinyl

 

[Goatshaver]

we leave .25in of white around the edges so they do not curl on calandered vinyl

What brand of overlaminate are you using?

 

[ProColorGraphics]

I use cast laminate on everything. Almost every shrinking issue I have experienced appeared to be the calendared laminate shrinking. I have pretty much eliminated that since I switched to using all cast laminates.

 

[Hero Signs]

What brand of overlaminate are you using?

We use Arlon for all digital prints.
3m for most cut vinyl since everyone specs it

 

[BigfishDM]

I often do stickers with RTapes vinylEFX metallic material. It's a royal pain in the a** but a lot of people love the shiny stuff. However I find it does curl up a bit and I know it has limitations for solvent printing, like leaving 6mm clear of any cuts to prevent curling.

Now even with doing that I still stuff that will curl eventually but I think it's just the laminate shrinking up a little.

Would a cast overlam possibly mitigate this? and if so what is a decent cheaper cast overlam that I can look into trying?

Cast will help for sure and I have a deal on cast lam if you are interested.

 

[icedhot]

what suppliers do you use to get 3M 8048 non-PVC?

 

[Christian @ 2CT Media]

Fellers or Montroy