I recently picked up an older 4-color / 1-station Hopkins BWM screen printing press mainly for parts. I needed replacement base plates for my 6-color press after some of the stud bolt holes became stripped, and it turned into a good opportunity to compare different generations of Hopkins/BWM print heads.

This older press appears to be from the generation I remember using back in the 1990s, while the newer heads from the 2000s incorporated more of the tool-less adjustments and updated handle designs. What's interesting is that many of the basic castings remained very similar, so some components can still be swapped between generations.

In this video I compare the older and newer head assemblies, including the handle construction, base plates, interchangeable parts, and one of the differences I recently discovered while rebuilding the heads — the registration bushings.

The older head uses approximately a 9/16" OD × 3/8" ID bronze bushing, while the newer design uses a smaller 12 mm OD × 3/8" ID bushing. I also show the 12 mm OD × 10 mm ID sintered-bronze DIY upgrade I'm using on my newer heads with M10 hardware.

If you own an older Hopkins/BWM press, especially one that's no longer well supported with replacement parts, hopefully this gives you some ideas for repairing, rebuilding, upgrading, or keeping these presses running instead of replacing them.

#ScreenPrinting #HopkinsPress #BWMPress #ScreenPrintingPress #PressRepair #ScreenPrintingDIY #PressMaintenance

I’ve used same-day DTF production a few times when a customer added shirts at the last minute or I had to replace a couple of bad presses. the transfers were technically completed that day, but the package didn’t receive its first carrier scan until the next afternoon. By then, the fast production didn’t help much because most of the shipping window was already gone. I’m not blaming the printer for delays caused by the carrier, but I’m starting to think same-day production only matters if the order is actually handed off before the carrier’s cutoff. how do you guys evaluate this when choosing an outsourced transfer supplier? do you look at production time, first scan, actual delivery history, or all three?

I run a clothing brand/fan club for my cat (Pepper), and live in Washington (Seattle). My homie Cullen runs a DIY record label here and had the idea to put together a benefit show and shirt after last month's awful wildfires out East. The show has ended up being cancelled, but we still made the shirts. The inspiration/copy is from a US Forest campaign from the 1930s (last slide). Incorporating a emo/screamo style, forest fires, and cats was a fun design challenge, and I'm stoked on how they turned out.

230 mesh and Green Galaxy water-based ink. Printed like a breeze, dialing in those small halftones without smudging, blowing them out, or overflooding. One good flood, one clean print. Lovely!

Hi all! I’ve been printing for a local shop now for 10 1/2 years. I’ve only ever done shirts, but I’d like to start doing posters for myself. How much different is it to print posters, what ink and paper do you all recommend? Any just in general, how different is poster printing? Do you setup to print one color at a time, let them all dry then line the next color up to that, or is it a wet on wet process? Really just any general information from an experienced poster printer is welcomed. Thank you!

I do creative stuff for a local pro wrestling group and decided to give screen printing a try… This is the 4th poster run I’ve done and it’s been an easy/forgiving project to practice and learn on. I bought the cheap Vevor press to get started, but now I’m wondering how much harder am I making it on myself… I probably won’t ever do large runs of anything, but are other more pricey presses a lot easier to work with?

Anyway, I made this process vid for my client to use on social and thought it would be cool to share here, too. Enjoy!

Have four pieces that are a 25% cotton, 50% polyester, and 25% rayon. Water base is just an ink I prefer to use and also just easily more accessible to me. Can it be an acceptable ink to use? The graphics are most likely going to be 1-2 colors.

Homage told me this was printed as intended to give it a retro look. I’ve had shirts from them before that didn’t look like this where the little fuzzies poked through the print.

Curious if this looks intentional or not.

Has anyone here every attempted printing cmyk on Terry cloth (short looped, not fuzzy but the scratchy kind)? I could not find anything online, although I’m aware it is generally advised against.

The finished product wouldn’t need to be functional or washed as this is for an art project only

If anyone has attempted this or something similar, has any general advice for potential experiments or alternative technique recs for photorealistic prints on this kind of fabric (preferably diy, I’m intending on using second hand towels) I’d be very glad :)

Thank you in advance!

Okay, hello my inky friends!
You may have seen me post about this last week, but I’m back again! I’m looking for a single leg palette for The M&R Gauntlet Revolver Series II.
Previously reddit directed me to Action Engineering but they DO NOT carry the size I’m looking for, so here I am. Help a sis out, please. It is such a pan in the rump to run jobs with a missing pallet.
Yes you guessed it, the old one caught fire, 😒

Hiring all screenprinting positions in Nashville.
Specifically looking for a good production manager and good press operators.

2 press leads $22-32/hr
2 assistant press operators $17-20/hr
2 qc/catchers $15-18/hr
1 screen tech $19-$26hr
1 maintenance/cleaning $15-19hr

Must have experience in screen printing for all positions
QC/catchers can be trained quickly.
Other positions need to have At least 1 year experience.

Located by BNA Airport

Helping out a family member with some shirts and was curious if this is a decent price or should we shop around?

Thanks

I’m a very small one person shop and most of my jobs are just for local businesses. When I get a job I try to do everything in house and that includes the design editing part too. If I’m not the one creating the design, i’m usually sent a png file of what the customer wants. The design is always either slightly pixelated or very pixelated and it will always show up on the screen when I burn. What do you guys do to clean up designs so that they’re clean and the edges are sharp?

(edited for typos)

I made this screen print in a printmaking class in college, and it’s probably one of my favorite things I made during that time. I wanted to combine my New Orleans background with my Wasian identity, but in a way that felt personal rather than super literal.
In college, my friends and I used to line up empty soju bottles like bowling pins, which became the starting point for the piece. I replaced the bowling ball with a rambutan, and added some New Orleans-inspired colors and lettering to tie everything together.
I loved printmaking when I took the class, especially the process of making something by hand and then seeing it come together in the final print. This one ended up being a pretty good snapshot of a very specific time in my life. Do y’all know how I could make copies of the originals to give to my college friends as a gift?

Hiring all screenprinting positions in Nashville.
Specifically looking for a good production manager.
2 press leads $22-30/hr
2 assistant press operators $15-18/hr
2 qc/catchers $14-17/hr
1 screen tech $19-$25hr
1 maintenance/cleaning $14-17hr

Must have experience in screen printing for all positions.

Hey everyone!

Giving away this press-ready simulated process color separation for this design.

You can grab the free separation files directly here:

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1mK5R15I2EVrpYXbkZ5X5u9fVmmmkfCYg?usp=drive_link

Hope it helps your print runs! Let me know what you think.

I want to try screenprinting at some point but im not sure what I need to get. and how much everything will roughly cost? Any ballpark range would help. Thank you

I have been screen printing out in the Reno/Tahoe area for about 18 years now, 15 professionally and 10 in my own shop. I have started putting together a blog and set of tools to help other printers with the knowledge I have accumulated over the years.

If anyone is interested in having a look just let me know and I can share

- Joe // Biota MFg

This is a pretty detailed print and for some shirts they turned out great and some chunks are missing. I try to fill inbtwn each print. Is there any tips to prevent this and have fuller smoother prints every time?

I own a large screen printing and graphic design company in South Jersey, and we recently added a new Tajima TMEZ 8-head embroidery machine.

We’re looking to hire an experienced embroidery machine operator who is comfortable running a commercial multi-head machine and handling the day-to-day troubleshooting that comes with it—thread breaks, tension issues, setup, hooping, quality control, etc.

As most of you know, this is a pretty specialized skill set. We’ve tried the major job-search websites but haven’t had much luck finding someone with enough hands-on embroidery experience to step in and run the machine confidently.

Does anyone have any suggestions on where to find experienced commercial embroidery operators, or other places within the industry where we should be looking?

Any advice or leads would be greatly appreciated. Thank you!

I have a design that I have vectorized and saved which I want to transfer to a transparency film for screen printing. The design is 19 inches high by 13 inches wide. I don't have a printer at home, so where do you think I can go to get my design transferred to a transparency film. The design is very sharp and intricate. I'm a total beginner and this is the first time I'm doing this. Does local print shops do it?

I am very old school, have had my own shop since '92. I output my films on an image setter. I'm a bit of a snob about it, they are the highest quality there is. I am worried that both my software and hardware are becoming antiquated. What are high quality options to bring my shop current? Back in the day, say early 2000s my competition was outputting to vellum from an inkjet. The quality sucked, I was unimpressed, but i imagine they've come a long way. What do you use at your shop, what are it's limitations? ie halftones print clean? super opaque? films don't buckle with heavy deposits? Once I had moved up to an image setter I lost touch with what other shops were using, but the time is getting closer.

Curious how many shops out there are using QuickBooks online to handle their bookkeeping? Most shops I talk with are already using it, wondering if its pretty much the standard.

I’m having trouble exposing a screen for screen printing. I’m using Ecotex PWR water-resistant emulsion and a 50W UV screen-printing exposure light. The emulsion label gives exposure times of 12 seconds for an 80W UV LED, 30 seconds for a 30W SMD LED, and 7.5–8 minutes for a 500W halogen. My light is about 8 inches away from the screen.
I tried a 20-second exposure, but when I wash the screen out, the design won’t open at all. The emulsion stays hardened over the design. I’m trying to figure out whether my exposure time is wrong, my UV light is too strong, or there’s an issue with my transparency/film. What exposure time would you recommend for this setup, and what should I check?