I have fun and make a living doing screen printing at home, and you can, too.
By Kevin Cuthbertson for Work-At-Home.org
This article will discuss the development of a skill that can be a lucrative work at home endeavor. The business or hobby of screen printing may definitely be conducted from your home. There are people that we know that screen print out of an extra room in their home, from a garage or from a shed in their backyard.
The two main resources that we used were a book titled, “How to Print T-Shirts for Fun and Profit” by Scott and Pat Fresener and a company named Tubelite. The book actually gives you very detailed instructions on how to build your own one-color screen printing press. That is exactly what we did. The book mentioned above is the only training or instruction that I ever had. “How to Print T-Shirts for Fun and Profit” is the first item that I would recommend getting for your work at home business. Tubelite offers all of the supplies that are needed to do the actual printing.
We began our home based screen printing business right from our kitchen table and oven. We made our own one-color screen printing press from instructions in a book and supplies from Tubelite. Our first attempt at a screen printed garment is still being worn today. It was a gray sweatshirt with the logo “RMB Sports” printed on the left chest and the ink was cured in our kitchen oven. We couldn’t believe that we had done that, but it worked. So, we knew then that this could be done.
The next issues that we needed to solve were where would we set this one-color press up and how would we cure the ink on many shirts at one time? We made room in our 14’ x 16’ outdoor shed for a table to put the press on and to set up a flash dryer. Obviously, we had to have electricity run to the shed for the dryer and lighting. During the summer months we also hooked up a fan to circulate the air in the shed. It gets hot in there with the dryer going. With a little word of mouth advertising, we had our first orders.
Silk screening can be used to make signs, posters, clothing, caps, and much more.
Since we were out in the country, we wanted bio-friendly chemicals to work with. So, we searched for and found a company named Franmar Chemicals that sells environmentally safe chemicals for screen printing. Another good resource is the website www.silkscreeningsupplies.com. They offer start-up packages and many accessories to the industry. Screen printing and heat transferring are businesses that may easily be work at home businesses.
Some common equipment that you will need to get started are several metal putty knives, masking tape (1.5 to 2 inches wide), paper towels, squeegees, inks and several screens (probably 20” x 24” outside dimensions) with different mesh counts. Mesh count refers to how many strands of mesh fiber there are per inch of mesh. For instance, mesh with a mesh count of between 60 and 110 lets more ink through in and would usually be used for printing white ink and maybe printing numbers on jerseys. For darker inks you could use a screen with a mesh count of between 156 and up. The masking tape will be used to tape closed the areas where the emulsion does not cover.
Let me speak about emulsion for a few minutes. Emulsion is the substance that you will put on the screen mesh, using an emulsion scoop coater, to be exposed by ultraviolet light. Emulsion sort of acts like film in a camera. The materials to make (mix) the emulsion comes in a box which contains two plastic bottles. One plastic bottle contains the liquid base of the emulsion and the other plastic bottle contains the powdered activator. The activator needs water added to its bottle and shaken for a couple of minutes and then its contents are poured into the bottle that contains the liquid emulsion base. This is then stirred with something like a wooden paint stirrer for a few minutes. Then it is ready to use. All work with emulsion must be performed in dark or non-white light conditions. What we did was purchase several incandescent “yellow bug” light bulbs. We would replace our bathroom fixture lights with these yellow bulbs while we were mixing and applying the emulsion and while the screens, with the emulsion on them, were drying in the bathtub.
Once the emulsion on the screen’s mesh was dry, we would then use the outdoor sunlight to expose the design onto the screen’s emulsion. This was accomplished by taking one screen and placing a piece of foam rubber covered in black cloth against the side of the screen that was not flush with the wood frame. On the other side of the screen, where the mesh is flush with the wooden frame, we would tape the design. The design is in black ink on vellum or on a piece of acetate (like a piece of transparency used in a copier). We always took our artwork on paper to a paper printer to put it on vellum or acetate. On top of the taped artwork we would place a piece of plate glass about a quarter of an inch thick that we got from a glass company. Now, all of this must be set up in the dark room (yellow light). When everything is ready and while holding everything in place, you take it outside for usually only a few seconds for the sun to expose the emulsion where the artwork is not covering the artwork. This hardens the emulsion around the artwork and under the artwork the emulsion stays soft so it may be washed out. As soon as the appropriate time has elapsed, you take the whole screen as is back into the dark room.
Now, back in the dark room, take all of the items off of the screen and place it in your washout area (bathtub). Using a sprayer with an adjustable nozzle and water, which we bought from a home improvement store, spray out the emulsion that was under the artwork design. This emulsion should still be soft and with a little water on it it will be easy to wash out of the mesh. The screen may then be taken outside to dry in the sunlight. Your screen is now ready to be put on your press and print a garment.
To close, trial and error are a must in learning this home business. Don’t be afraid of making mistakes. If you are afraid of making mistakes, please do not try this business. It will work and you can perfect this work at home business.
Kevin Cuthbertson is a home-based entrepreneur and aspiring freelance writer. He operates his own silk screen business from home.
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