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The Challenger III is the latest model in the Challenger series,
which was introduced in the 80s
What are the key trends in screen
printing presses at the moment?
Most press manufacturers are focusing
a lot of attention on design enhance-
ments to improve set-up speed. Examples
include integrated screen pre-registra-
tion systems, and the ability to store and
recall press printing parameters, and/or
flash-cure settings as recipes that can be
recalled for future jobs. Greater uptime
equals increased profit
Tell us a bit about the development
process at M&R
At M&R, new press development is a
continuous and an on-going process for
our engineering team. We rely heavily
on customer feedback in calibrating the
direction of our design and development
process to meet customer and market
requirements. A recent example is the
development of high performance oval
format presses to support the transition of
the major activewear brands from plastisol
inks to non-PVC inks. While plastisol inks
support wet-on-wet printing of eight or
more colours, the new high solids acrylic
water-based and PVC-free inks generally
require a greater number of intermediate
flash curing stations. This requirement has
been a driving force in the resurgence of
oval format automatic presses.
How have presses changed since M&R
started out?
The amazing thing about automatic press
design over the past 30 years M&R has
been in business is that everything has
changed except the price. A new
press buyer will pay almost the same
amount to purchase a 10-station/
eight-colour Sportsman EX car-
ousel automatic press in 2017 as
they would have paid back in 1987
when the M&R Challenger series
presses were first introduced. The
difference with today’s genera-
tion of presses is that they come
equipped with a colour touch-
screen interface, servo indexer,
AC print head drive, pneumatic
screen-locks, squeegee, and
floodbar air locks and pressure
different equipment manufacturers under
consideration. Hold the manufacturer
accountable to providing a solution that
meets the requirements without being
overkill.
What is the main mistake people make
when using an automatic press, and
how could they avoid it?
While most people work hard to select the
correct press for their needs, they often
fail to complete a business process anal-
ysis to confirm that the other parts of the
production process support the increased
capacity of an automatic press. I’ve seen
too many cases where a business owner
was unable to enjoy the full benefit of
their new automatic because of bottle-
necks in pre-press, dryer capacity, or a
lack of space to store blank and printed
garments.
What one piece of advice would you
give to garment decorators to help
them get more out of their presses?
I’d encourage all ‘equipment owners’ to
invest the time to get to know how to
operate their press, and not leave this
knowledge totally in the hands of their
employees. As a business owner, it’s im-
portant to know what your equipment is
capable of and to take steps to ensure that
it is consistently operated to maximum
effectiveness.
w
regulators, along with a host of standard
features that were either options or just
not available back in the day.
Has the demand for automatic presses
versus manual presses changed?
The opportunity to put a full manual
screen printing shop together with a
six-colour/four-station press, flash cure
unit, conveyor dryer, exposure unit, film
output device, screens, inks and related
supplies for a relatively modest financial
investment supports a continued flow of
new companies entering the screen print-
ing industry to serve niche garment deco-
rating applications. Ten years ago when a
company’s production requirements out-
grew its manual print capacity, it was quite
common to hire additional employees and
to add a second or third manual press to
the operation. With today’s higher labour
costs and the difficulty of hiring skilled
employees, it’s much more common for
companies to go directly from a single
manual press to a first automatic press.
What should people consider before
purchasing a press?
Take the time to learn about the market
segment you will be serving to deter-
mine the format size, number of colours,
fabric types and ink chemistries that are
required. Use this information to establish
a ‘request for proposal’ to communicate
a common set of requirements with the
Talking screen printing
presses with PeterWalsh
Peter Walsh, vice president of sales at The M&R Companies, discusses how
presses have changed over the past 30 years and what to consider before
buying one
64 images FEBRUARY 2017
KB SCREEN PRINTING PRESSES