Cleaning lots of Rowmark.

[Joe Pelonio]

Most all of those type things, we engrave, pull the material out, apply transfer tape to the face, put back in and vector cut. The end result is something ready for the customer for the most part. If you leave the tape on, it's a "protective" layer that they can peel off when installing, or if they want it off, we can peel them. We talk about the finished, masked plates as a "premium" level of service You'd be surprised how many people like that idea.

Either way, it means you don't have to really clean anything on the face. You can clean the entire face prior to putting the tape on, but for the most part, the transfer tape pulls off the residue when it's removed.

Exactly the way I do it too. The worst is white letters on red.

[Bob Keyes]

Here's how I make mine, and I do a lot of them. Remove plastic from Romark. Cover with paper transfer tape. Engrave then cut. Remove pieces.

I have a tumbler made to tumble rocks. It has 2 rubber drums that rotate on a stand. (Cheap at Harbor Freight.) I load about 50 tags in each drum. Fill about 1/2 full of hot water, a good shot of Dawn and Krud Kutter. Tumble about 2 hours sometimes longer if I forget. Open containers, rinse off paper, dry and package. Little, if any weeding or cleaning done.

Hope this helps you.

[Joe Hillmann]

Bob, Does the tumbler remove the stickiness from the cut edges of the rowmark? If so I can see how that would work great for name tags or any tags that get handled.

[Joe Hillmann]

Is anyone willing to post what they charge for small rowmark tags? In the 3 to 5 square inch range? I normally charge $1.15 per square inch for small tags but on this job I am charging $1.10 since all the tags have square rather than rounded corners.

When originally bid the job I thought I would come out pretty good but now that it is all said and done all the cleaning, sorting, proof checking, trying to contact the customer to figure out a mistake, and billing I didn't really come out nearly as well as I had expected.

[Randy Digby]

We do a lot of 1" x 3" plastic. We apply a light coat of dish washing detergent prior to engraving. A quick rinse off takes care of all but the yellow and white which take about three swipes of a Magic Eraser. For drying, I pull off about six to eight full sheets of paper towels still attached and lay out on a table. I place the tags on half of the area ( three to four sheets) and then hinge over the other half of the paper towels to cover the tags and pat down. If you are careful, you can get weeks out of the same length of paper towel.

[Patrick Cooley]

All,
I have a little different method. I produce thousands of tags a year for a manufacturing company. We cut them first. We leave the plastic on that Rowmark covers the plastic with. We then clean the edges with Naptha. We then peel and engrave. We feel this has been the most cost effective for us. I'm also not incurring extra time and cost for remasking. I'm using White/Black LaserMax material for most of my tags. I took two of the sheets that we cut from, and attached them to a piece of plywood. So while one tray is being engraved, I can load the second tray up for engraving.
I would love to find a material for exterior use that we didn't have to clean the edges.

[Tony Lenkic]

Patrick, how do edges look after a week if you do not clean them?
I know that right after removing them after cutting they are bit sticky bat after few days that is not a problem.

[Patrick Cooley]

Tony,
I agree they slightly better, but still have a good amount of black coming off them. I often cut them during the week, and then have one of my workers that comes in on the weekend clean and peel them. We don't notice a lot of difference when cleaning. I've talked with Rowmark at length in the past about this, and this was our best solution we found :-(
I'm interested in the new material rowmark has called ultra-grave someone mentioned earlier in the post.

[Tim Bateson]

I must be doing something wrong, because I seldom have sticky edges and most times a quick wipe of a cloth is all that is required for cleaning. Yes some like white & red have additional cleaning needs - a quick rinse and paper towel dry. I don't do the mass production that some have described but I do 50-100 Name Plates a week.

[Patrick Cooley]

Tim, wow, I'm impressed. I really really need your secret :-)
What settings are you using? I have a Epilog 75 watt, so I know they would be different, but it would be interesting to try it out.
Thanks
Pat.

[Patrick Licata]

Tim, you are NOT doing something wrong! If you don't have sticky edges, you are definitely doing something right. I would patented it and tell us how you do it! Or you can just tell us. I always seem to have sticky edges wether I cut all the way through or just part way and "snap" them out.

[Mike Null]

Mine are a bit sticky as well but I figured it was the IPI plastic I use.

[Gary Gardner]

What are you guys using to clean the tags? If I engrave on red or burgundy with white lettering, all I get is offwhite or pink lettering. I have used every cleaner I can fine but the staining won't come out. I even tried using the mister clean pad and soapy water on the stains but they won't come out.

Thanks
Gary

[Tim Bateson]

What are you guys using to clean the tags? If I engrave on red or burgundy with white lettering, all I get is offwhite or pink lettering. I have used every cleaner I can fine but the staining won't come out. I even tried using the mister clean pad and soapy water on the stains but they won't come out...y

For the few colors that have this issue, laser through a masking/transfer tape/light-medium stick. One pass to do the lasering, then a fast 2nd pass to clear out the lettering - if needed. Peal & weed the tape & you're done.

[Ron Fairbanks]

I'm with Tim, I've not had any problems with Rowmark (LaserMark anyway) material. I found that if I remove the protective film and do a quick clean with orange cleaner to remove the tacky finish prior to engraving or cutting and then run the job with the air pump on, all I get is some powdery material that blows right off. Just finished about 100 small to medium placards yesterday using the red / white material. A few pieces had some residue on the back side but since they all get 3m 468 tape on the back it doesn't matter.