Has anybody heat pressed ball caps?

[Stitch This]

I have an order for baseball caps with the logos heat transfered rather than embroidered. Any suggestions on the best ball caps for that?

[Juli in Kona]

I have recently been messing with heat transfer on hats, so I can give you my .02 worth of advise. Buy a couple of mouse pads and cut strips just a little wider than your design. Say your design is 2" tall - Cut the strips 2.5" wide. Cut enough of them so the the stack is about 1/4" tall or a little more. Tape the stack to the bottom platen in a position that you hat can comfortably rest on. You may have to fool around with this to get it just right. The tape you need is the special tape used just for this purpose and can be bought from your reg supplier.

The reason you need this build up is that the heat press can (it certainly did on mine!) smash the hat down and create permanent wrinkles. By lifting the cap off the too wide platen, the top part will only be pressing the area of the mousepad buildup. It does work.

You probably need to to all that with a cool press. I wouldn't like to do it hot.

And don't let them talk you into a design that is too large. Just like embroidery, the size of the vinyl design has limitations.

[levelbest]

If you don't mind spending a few bucks, buy a dedicated cap press. Can do caps, small bags, umbrellas etc. We did and it makes simple and quick work of heat pressed caps. No regrets.

Great for ecofilm/cut vinyl transfer scraps too - give aways....

CAP PRESS FROM IMPRINTABLES

[signman]

Geo. Knight in Massachussetts makes the best hat presses around (and also makes them FOR other suppliers-so deal direct and cut out the middleman).
For heatsealing decals and laser cut emblems, you want 5 panel caps-without the center seam. Only way around it is if your design 'splits' in the middle otherwise that seam on a 6 panel is going to give you nightmares.
NEver do a hat on a flat press-that is just asking for trouble. Get a hat press! It is also great for preflattening 6 panel seams before you sew them on your Amaya, and for taking out the pucker in unstructured hats. Also can be used for names over pockets, sleeves, small decals on blankets-almost anything you don't want to fire up your big teeshirt machine for! I've been using mine for over 20 years.

[Stitch This]

I bought the Geo Knight DK7 Cap Press - just arrived today. What I am looking for is which caps should I use? Brand, style#, etc?

[levelbest]

Love pretty much anything Otto... great quality, reasonable prices.

[Vic]

Otto Caps has anything you want and they Heat Press great.

[signman]

I've done tons of them over the past 25 years...just remember you cannot heat press a full decal across 6 panel hats-the seam ruins it. IF the logo or lettering is 'split' you can do it-otherwise stay with 5 panel hats.
Geo. Knight has some great hat presses with a 'hold down' feature so you can line up the decal and hold it in place while you bring the platen head down without burning your fingers.