Digital technologies/Textiles/How to use the Heat Press

Here are some instructions on how to press a vinyl decal of a desired profile onto a piece of fabric using the heat press. Within this process you will be required to use the laser cutter to get an accurate profile of the desired design. Using this process, it is possible to cut the vinyl sheet in any shape or design that you desire. Furthermore, using Inkscape’s built-in feature for bitmapping, it is possible to take any image found online and make a vinyl cut of it.

The process is one of three parts: Inkscape design, laser cutting, and heat press onto fabric.

Inkscape Design

1. Install Inkscape

2. Open a new document

3. Change the document properties to fit the size of the design you desire (file>document properties)

4. Create the desired design

a. Create the design you desire using the different tools in the tool bar on the left of the Inkscape window

b. Find a premade design online> copy past the picture into Inkscape>generates a bitmap of the design (path>trace bitmap)>adjust the chosen mapping tool to get the desired image profile

5. Now invert the design using the flip tool in the toolbar

6. For the design remove any Fill (Object>Fill and stroke>Fill)

7. Change the colour of the stroke paint to RGB by having the following values (Object>Fill and stroke>Stroke paint>RGB)

8. Change the stroke width of your design to 0.001 inches (Object>Fill and stroke>stroke style)

9. Now save the document as a PDF document (File>Save as> PDF)

Laser cutting

If you prefer to use the Cricut machine to cut out your vinyl design, go to this link and review the steps for how to use it here.

1. Turn on the laser cutter

2. Open the PDF document in adobe acrobat

3. Select print

4. Within the printing window select the laser cutter among the different printers

5. Open the laser cutter print properties

6. Now set the parameters to have a vector job with the following settings:

7. Now send the job to the Laser cutter by pressing print

8. Take a piece of vinyl and use 4 pieces of tape to secure it down to a piece of MDF (This is just to make sure your Vinyl stays flat in the laser cutter during the operation)

Note: position the pieces of tape in the 4 different corners, making sure that the tape does not cover the design. Furthermore, make sure the vinyl sheet is placed shiny side down.

9. Re-home/level the laser head on the plane if required

10. Start the laser cutting job.

Vinyl pressing onto material

1. Remove all undesired vinyl pieces from the vinyl sheet so that only the final design is left, peeling the vinyl off the shiny transparent plastic or cutting it with scissors

2. Turn on the heat press and set the temperature to 305°F

3. Position the vinyl design onto the fabric in the desired position (Shinny side up and sticky side down)

4. Take the fabric and centre it under the head of the heat press

5. Press the head of the heat press down onto the fabric using the clamp for 10 seconds

6. Lift the clamp on the heat press, re-press if needed then remove the fabric

7. Remove the sticky backing from the fabric and let cool

For more information on how to use a heat press, follow this link to the other wiki here.