Printing
Transfer saturates below 100 percent. The ink that stays on the paper was bought, printed and thrown away.
— %
Of the ink on the paper, what reaches the cloth
The saturating exponential has the right shape for transfer and the wrong shape for what happens after it: past the useful window, extra time and temperature stop adding transfer and start costing yellowing, hand and dimensional stability on the polyester, none of which this model sees, so a high dose figure is not permission to press longer. The ceiling is a property of the ink and the fibre together and is the single most sensitive input - it is lower on a heavy or tightly constructed fabric, on a blend where only part of the substrate accepts disperse dye, and on any ground already carrying a finish, and it should be measured by weighing paper before and after rather than assumed. Note that the residue is not recoverable and not inert: paper carrying unsublimed disperse dye is a colour-contamination risk anywhere near a heat source, which is a housekeeping point as much as a costing one. The model treats the whole laydown as a single ink; in practice the four process colours sublime at different rates, and a cycle tuned on total transfer will shift the hue of a mixed shade as the faster components leave first. Nothing here addresses gas-phase transfer distance, calender pressure or paper release coating, all of which move the ceiling.
Sublimation Transfer Yield & Ink Waste — free, with the formula and a worked example, at Textile School.