T-Shirt printing machines for your T-Shirt business

There are many different T-Shirt printing machines available and you would pick the one suited to the type of work you would be doing, but I'm going to be giving one example..the easiest. Screen printing is easy enough to get the hang of. You can do it yourself from home and afterwards explore other avenues best suited to your needs.

It might be easier designing your T-shirts with some sort of software program like photoshop or one of the many other ways you can design a T-shirt and take then take your T-shirts to be printed. This would save you a lot of time and hassle, but you wouldn’t get nearly as much profit as you would as hoped for. It is not a major science learning to screen print from home.

Once someone has made your frame and you have learnt all there is to know you are able to make your T-shirts as professional looking as the printers make them. You could even make more profits by making your own frames, but at this stage learn one thing and then you could move ahead.

Here is a small project that anyone can start from home and you don't need any sort of t-shirt printing machine for. If you want to go bigger it’s easy to get a bigger frame, but it’s always best to start small when taking on a big project just to get the idea then you don’t end up tearing your hair out in frustration.

Things you will need

• Embroidery hoop
• Matte Glue, a good make is Hod Podge
• Pencil
• Various size brushes
• Scissors
• Nylon Fabric to fit between the embroidery hoop. The hoop will act as the screen printing mesh.
• A squeegee, which you can get from any craft store that supplies screen printing supplies.
• Some ink, you can buy special printing ink for fabric, but as you go you should shop around to see what is the cheapest and most economical for your business. Buy in bulk from a wholesaler.

Split the embroidery hoop in two and place the nylon material over one of the hoops. Place the other hoop on top. The material should be tight. Cut the remaining material away. Glue the sides of the hoop so that the hoop is more secure. Allow an hour for it to dry.

Find a design that you like and trace it onto the screen with your pencil. You can draw over the design with a marking pen if it is too faint.

After you have done that take the glue and paint with the brushes where ever you don’t want the ink to go on your shirt. In essence this will block out anything, allowing only your design to show through. Let this set for 24 hours.

When you are ready to print on to your T-shirt make sure you have a sheet of newspaper handy that you can slip in between the front and the back so that the ink doesn’t run through to the back.

If it’s easier you could use a stiff piece of cardboard instead of a squeegee. Just place a blob of paint on the screen and move it down in one action, making sure everything is covered.

Wash the screen in cold water.

T-Shirt silk screen printing machine

When it comes to creating T-shirts with more than 2 colors it becomes a little more complicated and when it goes as far as six colors you will definitely need a machine to help you. These are in the shape of a carousel and you will still have your screens to insert into the carousel. You can also find a used T-shirt printing machine that would still be in good condition.

Heat Transfer Printing

A type of screen printing machine. This is a lot quicker than screen printing, although some say it doesn’t last as long. It comes in the form of a machine where heat is transferred to press a photo or design on the T-Shirt.

Vinyl Printers

This is not popular with mass production because of the cost, but is used because of their support for colour layering and the quality is good

Sublimation printing

Ink turns into gas directly during the heating process, but should be restricted to certain fabrics because the toners used in the printing give the fabric a different texture.