What is a Screen Dryer?
A screen dryer is exactly what it sounds like, a cabinet that is used to dry screens. A screen dryer is very handy to have in a screen printing shop as it will drastically reduce the amount of time it takes to dry water within a screen or emulsion that has been coated. Most screen dryers are built to hold around 10 screens at a time and contain a heating element and a fan. So, at its core, a screen dryer is a box with shelves for the screens, a heater (similar to a space heater), and a fan.
Why Buy a Screen Dryer?
Screen dryers fall in between a want and a need as far as equipment goes in a screen printing shop. Technically screens can be dried by being stored at room temperature and eventually water will completely evaporate out of the screen / emulsion will dry/harden. However, a screen dryer drastically speeds up the drying process and helps prevent small problems from occurring to the screen that sometimes happen when you dry screens without equipment.
How to Choose the Right Screen Dryer
When selecting a screen dryer to purchase it is important that you think about the potential different size of screens that might need to be dried. Most manual screen printing presses use a 20x24 screen, where as most automatics use a 23x31. If there is any potential that your shop might use both size screens, then you should really consider a dryer that can hold both 20x24 and 23x31 screens. Because screen dryers are so simple and do not affect the quality of a print, it is not important that you necessarily buy the nicest and most expensive one on the market.
