What are the pros & cons of different Canvas blends?

[philbaum]

These are the canvas types i most often see advertised: 100% cotton, 65/35 polyester-cotton, and all polyester.  Briefly if you can, which one are you most often using, and what are the major disadvantages/advantages of the other types.

A friend of mine recently bought an inexpensive 16"x40' roll of all cotton canvas.  He later told me that the canvas had shrunk 1/2" after printing and coating, which was going to make life difficult finding custom stretcher bars.  When i measured it later, it actually shrunk 3/8" in 16", which equates to 2.3%.  Are some manufacturers of all cotton canvas preshrinking them, or is shrinkage always a problem with cotton canvas?

All that i've used in my printer is a poly/cotten blend so haven't experienced print shrinkage before.  So thats the background of my question.  Also, which blend is better for printing quality?   Thank you for any information you can share on this topic!

[I.T. Supplies]

We actually carry the different types of canvas as well as the stretcher bars.  As far as I'm aware, the canvas should shrink that much of it's the 100% cotton while the cotton/poly blend is great for keeping its size after printing and coating.

Our Simply Elegant Everyday Matte Canvas is 100% polyester fibre that comes in longer lengths most other canvas and great for stretching.
It really depends on the material the canvas is made from.  Most canvas that we carry can be made for doing gallery wraps.  Like Epson Exhibition Canvas (the replacement of Epson Premium Canvas), many customers didn't like the way it is since it's thicker and it's not as easy to stretch.

It's basically user preference for these.  We've tested the different products and haven't had too much of problems stretching most of these supplied canvas's.

If you're curious on the other options and durability, feel free to contact us.

sales@atlex.com

[bill t.]

Poly canvases have the deepest and most evenly spaced textures.  Some would say "screen door" texture.  They are also the cheapest canvases and the ones most free of surface defects.  Go figure.  I use 3 different cotton/poly canvases.  They all exhibit some natural looking variation in surface texture, along with too-frequent, print-killing surface defects.  At three times the price of poly.

On an 8 foot wide print, I rarely see more than about 2mm variation in the long dimension between when the print comes out of the printer to when it is, coated and mounted on Gator.  Wouldn't be surprised if most of that 3/8" variation came from the printer not advancing the media properly.  Most printers have a way for you to tweak the paper advance, and my 8300 is exceedingly accurate in that regard.  Getting the advance adjusted properly is also important to profile accuracy.