Cool Off With SubliCraft Velcro Can Cooler Wraps
As an alternative to the usual can cooler, SubliCraft’s 12 ounce velcro can cooler wraps are ready to cover your favorite drinks with style. With its fully flat nature prior to pressing, you have the chance of creating a wrap design that completely surrounds any standard can. We’ll be showing you how to achieve this with a Sawgrass SG500 sublimation printer, and HPN heat press.
First, you’ll need to prepare your image or graphic within the imprint area of a SubliCraft velcro wrap. You can alternatively use a PDF template for this step, though we’ll show how to prepare a graphic from scratch. On graphic design software like Adobe Illustrator, this is just a matter of creating a rectangle that’s a quarter-inch larger than both the width and height of the imprint dimensions. Import or piece together your graphic to scale down within the rectangle, organize it below, then select both your graphic and rectangle to Create Clipping Mask. Your graphic will now be ready to print without any risk of image clipping in application.
Sawgrass users will need to send their graphic to Sawgrass Print Manager with these settings: Substrate to Polyester, Paper to your paper’s profile, leave Mirror checked, and in the Color tab, set the Color Mode to Photographic or Vivid depending on your graphic’s color saturation. With these settings in, go ahead and click Print.
Now that the transfer’s ready, trim your graphic around its edges and it’ll be ready to apply to a wrap. Let’s turn on the heat press and set it to 60 seconds at 385 degrees Fahrenheit with medium pressure. Once the machine’s at temperature, cover the lower platen with parchment paper, then add your transfer on top facing up. The velcro wrap itself will then be placed with its white side facing toward the printed image, attaching it in place with heat tape.
Flip the items with the paper side up, cover them with another parchment paper sheet and press. After 60 seconds, open your machine and allow the items to cool down for at least 20 seconds. Once cooled, quickly peel the transfer off the wrap and it’s now been applied with your very own graphic. If your wrap starts to bow after being pressed however, be sure to peel your transfer off instantly to prevent ghosting. Simply wrap it around any standard 12 ounce can to see how it appears as intended.
You can learn more about SubliCraft velcro wraps and other blanks on our YouTube channel, or at HeatPressNation.com.
