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I looked into this a couple years ago and all the budget/made in China ones are fine until they’re not, at which point parts etc. are impossible to source.
Better to wait it out on eBay/gumtree etc. for a decent used one unless you needed it yesterday.
lmamammal-
haha, yes - that's a very good point - 'it's fine until it's not'. I'm accepting of the quality not being too durable, and will look to replace/enhance anything shonky looking straight away. Add better bolts/washers/bushings etc to improve stress management through the moving parts would extend the life and ease of use.
I'll take a look and see if I can figure out the power draw of the Pfaff 1222 - it can't be massive, but probably worth checking against a modern servo motor ...it's got a filament bulb in, which is probably the equivalent of a whole room of LED lighting on a boat though?!
Chopsicle
Does anyone have any experience of budget heatpresses?
I'm looking to do small heat-transfer/film labels, plus potentially A4ish sublimation. Would be used occasionally for samples and small batch runs - ie, I'm not banging out T-shirts all day. Power would run from oven loop on consumer unit, with heavyweight extension cable, and would have a ventilation unit to extract glue/heat fumes.
Looking around there's a handful of models which are re-badged at the £120-£150 mark. Some look better quality than others, but it's impossible to tell ...an attractive thing at this price is that it includes other accessory elements for smaller items, caps etc
There's then a step up to £600+ models, which isn't out of the question, but would prefer not to spend this much, unless necessary and the cheaper ones are a false economy.
Any insight gratefully received, thank you!