Testing force drying matte canvas

[dgberg]

I have a little free time today to finally do some testing. Printing with Epson 9900 onto Lexjet Sunset Select Bright Matte canvas.
I have been getting larger canvas orders and have a terrible bottleneck with drying canvas off the printer as well as slow drying varnish top coats.
Rather then move to a better drying topcoat I have elected to test force drying the canvas and then vinyl heat laminate.. We have a hot roll laminator but we can never seem to have the right size loaded without too much waste.
With my 2 heat presses and the portable heaters we hope to be able to go from printing to mounting all in the same day.
From the printer I am laying it under two 1500 watt heater fans just for the length of time it takes for the printer to print the next one. About 5 minutes.
I then lay the print in my smaller heat press set for 300 degrees for another 2 minutes. Next step is to put in in the larger heat press to apply the over laminate. Presently using Seal Print Guard Luster.
I have a large roll of perforated Drytac ArtShield Satinex on the way.
In the past I was letting these prints dry overnight then spraying 2 coats of Glamor II the next day. All in all a full 2 day process.
Started at 8 am and have 10 completed and ready for mounting. Should have all 40 I have to do finished my noon.
Looking closely at the colors and no issues that I can see.
The only negative that I see is the electric consumption of all these machines.

[Mark Lindquist]

Just a thought Dan -
If you build a large box (cabinet) big enough to slide hanging canvases inside, perhaps a high capacity dehumidifier would pull the moisture out of the cabinet with the right exhaust hoses. A drain hose would pull the water out and away, and a dryer vent could put the hot air outside.

Meanwhile the dehumidifier dries things down quickly, especially if there is a heating strip or two inside.

Rough concept, but could be experimented with.

-Mark

[dgberg]

Do you think force drying with heat will cause some adverse effect to the canvas?

[Mark Lindquist]

No. Other than shrinkage, I don't see a problem.  Testing will show if you get any stress cracking of the ink, but I really doubt it.