How to Troubleshoot and Fix Wet Ink Sticking to Your Teflon

How to Troubleshoot and Fix Wet Ink Sticking to Your Teflon

One of the most common questions we get for the Stampinator is ink sticking to the Teflon. This happens for one of two reasons. Either your ink is over-cured, or under-cured. It can be difficult to assess which is happening, so here's some tips on how to figure this issue out. 

If you touch the print with your finger once it's been stamped and you have ink on your finger, your print is more than likely under cured. If you have ink sticking to your Teflon and the ink is not wet on the garment after being stamped, your ink is likely over cured. 

Time and Temp

Simply put, it's all about time and temp. Once you figure out rather your ink is over or under cured, it's time to dial in your settings. Since the Stampinator makes contact with the print, it's able to cure much faster than a flash or conveyor dryer which cures the ink from a few inches above the print. Because of this, you have more leeway to over or under cure the garment. That means that there's less margin for error, time and temp wise, when curing with the Stampinator. 

When you make adjustments to the Stampinator, you will want to make these adjustments in small increments. You don't want to go from 3 seconds to 10 seconds, or 325 to 365 degrees. Instead, test in 5 degree or 1 second increments. If your temp was set at 350 degrees, try stamping at 355. If your time was set to 7 seconds, try upping the time to 8 seconds. 

Remember to clean your Teflon sheet off before testing! It should still wipe right off, but remember the Stampinator is going to be very hot, so do this with extreme caution. 

When you don't see any ink left over on the Teflon, you know you're on the right track. If you are using the Stampinator for the final cure, you's still want to do a stretch/wash test if possible to make sure your prints are fully cured. 

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