Pantone Color matching for T-shirt printing - A great place to start, but...

Yes and No. Yes t-shirt printers and match pantone colors and many have complex systems and ink mixing machines that help with the process. However this is only reasonable for large jobs. I've found that even when you do match a pantone color for a print job the inks can look different wet than dry and surprise it's still not exact. Also the color of the shirt next to the ink can affect your eye which changes the perception of the color. Mixing a pantone color for screenprinting also must take into account that the person using the pantone book should use Uncoated reference chips and not coated. Screen vibrancy is nothing compared to flat cloth, so don't think that a backlight design shown on a computer is going to look the same. In fact, I think it often looks better in ink on cloth, but that is a matter of opinion. Pantone numbers are great references for screenprinting but they only put you in the ballpark. Always think of pantone colors as a range of colors or as a reference for the rest of us. The final result will be hue on one side of the color or the other. Paper printing is different and Pantones were created for that industry, which explains the difference. Screen printing is like starting a fire with two rocks compared to the detail and accuracy available in offset printing. Here is a link to links for Pantone Color systems.