Projects

Benoni evening DTF bench

Two cousins, one garage and a T-shirt side hustle that runs after work. The printer was fine. The ink, powder and film needed a steadier routine.

Garage bench in Benoni with a bottle of white DTF ink, a pouch of white transfer powder and a 30 cm DTF film roll beside a compact bright blue and charcoal am.co.za DTF printer printing a colourful transfer, with folded black and white T-shirts on the right — The Benoni bench: white ink, powder and film from one supplier, next to the A3 DTF printer the cousins already owned.

Brief from Benoni: weak whites and a messy garage

The message reached us through our contact form. Two cousins in Benoni print custom T-shirts after their day jobs, from a single garage on the East Rand. They already ran a small A3 DTF printer bought from AM.CO.ZA and had a press corner next to it. What they lacked was a routine that held up from one evening to the next.

Their list of complaints was short and familiar. White underbase coming out thin. Transfer powder on the floor, the shelf and the cat, but not always on the print. Film lifting at the corners overnight. And every second Saturday starting with a head clean instead of an order.

They were clear that a bigger machine was not the answer. That is the kind of job our Side Hustle Print station is built around, so Hemant Lutchman, our Stations Lead, passed it to Fuad Isaacs, who looks after the DTF Garment Kit, to put a shortlist together.

The printer was fine. The consumables were not.

“On a small bench the printer usually gets the blame. Most of the time it is white ink that has settled, a powder that does not suit the film, or film that curls in a dry garage. Sort those three out and the same printer starts looking a lot better.”
Fuad Isaacs, DTF Garment Kit Specialist

Benoni is the opposite problem to our Durban humid week. Highveld air is dry, so film builds static, edges lift and powder clings to anything nearby. Fuad wanted consumables that behave the same way every evening and come from one place, so the cousins could stop mixing brands and guessing which one caused a bad print.

He went to AM.CO.ZA, the same company behind the machines in our kits, as set out in our machine partner note. Three things made it the obvious fit for this bench. Their team knows the printer the cousins already own, so a question about white density gets a straight answer. The prices sit well for what the ink and powder deliver. And their film, ink and powder are matched to the DTF printers they sell, which takes one variable off the table.

Shortlist from Sunnyrock: five items, nothing extra

The final list for the cousins was short on purpose, the same thinking behind our DTF Garment Kit pick:

White ink: a 1 kg bottle of FlowFlex white DTF textile pigment ink. White carries a DTF print, so Fuad's rule is a gentle shake of the bottle before each top-up to keep the pigment from settling in the tank.
Powder: a 1 kg pouch of white middle-sized DTF transfer powder, an all-rounder for cotton and blends.
Film: a 30 cm DTF film roll, kept flat in its sleeve so it does not curl overnight.
Press: the Heatware 380 x 380 mm clamshell flat press, which fits a garage bench and suits adult T-shirt prints.
Spare head: a sealed XP600 printhead, left boxed on the shelf so one bad Saturday does not cost a whole weekend.

Gloved hands spooning white DTF transfer powder over a freshly printed sunflower transfer in a plastic powder tray, with an am.co.za powder pouch and a white ink bottle on the bench behind — Powder goes on over the tray, and whatever falls off goes back into the pouch.

Set-up evening: one session, one rhythm

Fuad spent one appointment with the cousins and kept it practical. Artwork and film prep happen on weekday evenings. Printing, powdering and pressing happen on Saturday morning, darks first and lights after, so there is less switching between settings. The powder tray gets tipped back into the pouch and wiped down at the end of every session.

Before the session he sent them an AM.CO.ZA video that runs the whole flow, from an A3 DTF printer with an Epson XP600 head printing artwork onto DTF film, through to the transfer going under a 380 x 380 flat press.

“A rhythm is easier to copy once you have watched it. They paused the video on the powdering step and set their tray up exactly like that.”
Fuad Isaacs, DTF Garment Kit Specialist

Bright blue and charcoal am.co.za clamshell heat press open on a garage bench, with a hand peeling the clear carrier film off a sunflower DTF transfer on a black T-shirt and a stack of coloured T-shirts beside it — Peeling the carrier film on the Heatware clamshell press.

Care and calibration after the handover

Puleng Ngqula, who handles care and calibration across our kits, set the cousins up with a small care shelf: the sealed spare head, a lint-free cloth and the film sleeve, all in one spot.

“Most head trouble on a part-time bench comes from the printer standing for days. So the routine is a short nozzle check every evening it is switched on, even if nothing gets printed.”
Puleng Ngqula, Care and Calibration

For anything on the printer itself, since it came from AM.CO.ZA, we point Gauteng crews to the AM.CO.ZA Johannesburg branch and the AM.CO.ZA guide, which explains their printers, presses and consumables in plain language.

Sealed XP600 printhead with its ribbon cables in a padded spares box on a white care shelf, next to a bottle of white DTF ink, a roll of DTF film and a bright blue am.co.za DTF printer — The care shelf: spare head, ink and film kept together.

How it runs now: what the crew kept for the next order

The cousins reorder ink, powder and film together now, so the bench never runs on a mix of brands. Their whites come out solid, the powder stays in the tray, and Saturday starts with printing.

“That is what a shortlist is for. Choose the handful of things that make the bench work, from a partner whose stock and service you trust, and leave the rest of the catalogue alone.”
Hemant Lutchman, Stations Lead

Running an after-hours print bench of your own? Start with the Side Hustle Print station, book a walk-through at one of our showrooms, or ask Sunnyrock for a shortlist.

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