Luminous Landscape Forum
Raw & Post Processing, Printing => Printing: Printers, Papers and Inks => Topic started by: bellimages on March 04, 2011, 11:18:13 pm
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I purchased a D-roller a few months back. These things retail for $250 -- not cheap for a chromed metal 'rolling pin' with a sheet of plastic material adhered to it.
On each of the two long sides of the plastic sheet there are rubber strips (to grip the plastic when rolling it). The adhesive on these two strips has allowed them to 'slip,' thus exposing the adhesive that was to hold them in place. This attracts lint, dog hair, etc.
For $250, this should not happen. Does anyone know how to get ahold of the manufacturer. I understand from a Luminous Landscape review that it was designed by Don Dressler. But no where do I find a way to get in touch with him or his company. I purchased the item from Shades of Paper, but would prefer not contacting them.
Does anyone know of a contact for the manufacturer?
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Weird, looks like the official D-Roller site is gone. I would talk to the folks at SoP and see if they have a way to contact him. The SoP folks are good guys.
Neil
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I had the same problem with my D-Roller and emailed the manufacturer in October 2008 ([email protected], then). I never received any reply.
I was able to rehabilitate the D-Roller, more or less, by carefully peeling off the strips and cleaning the adhesive off the sheet with solvent. There was enough residual adhesive on the strips to reattach them, but they don't stay put as well as they should.
-Paul
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Hope they are not out of business. I have wanted one for a year now and just got hung up on its price and never bought it.
Had the same cost issue with the sediment removal roller that Drytac sells, but finally pulled the string on that $200 piece. It works really well.(It better for that kind of bucks.)
Just last week I see a Youtube video where the gal is demonstrating her $4.00 lint removal roller on prints and fabric before adhering Inkaid. (Did a fabulous job by the way.)
Randy, give us the scoop if these are still being sold.
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FWIW, I believe the company is/was based in Glastonbury CT.
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I've been using two De-Rollers for a number of years and of course this same problem has been evident with both. I've done the peel and re-stick procedure a couple of times and then I decided to take the fix a bit further. The last time I had to peel the strips and redo them I put a couple of staples through the strips near the core end. That seems to help keep them from migrating in one direction at least. I'm about to do this again soon and I think I'll try a few staples along the length of the strips as well. Since the paper fits well within the strip path the staples present no problem.
I've checked the Bienfang site a couple of times within the past year and the De-Roller is no longer listed. I believe Bienfang bought the product from the original designer and they were the main distributor, but it would seem that they have given up on it. As a matter of fact it would appear that Bienfang has miraculously morphed into a company by the name of Encore Products, so, who knows?
There have been homemade devices described on this forum and others and I may try one of those myself eventually. I do a lot of roll printing, both RC and otherwise, so some sort of de-curling device is a definite necessity. However, you can try the staple procedure for now. It does work and helps the adhesive do its job.
Gary
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The two rubber strips also help to give a small distance when rolling the plastic. To avoid to hard pressure on the paper.
Here's the address:
http://www.forframersonly.com/products.asp?ID=1&C=1
Wendy Harris
Sr. Service Specialist
D&K Framing Products
Formerly Bienfang Framing Products
Tele: 888-240-6021 ext. 10
Email: [email protected]
/Sven
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http://aztek.com/Deroller.html
db
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There have been homemade devices described on this forum and others and I may try one of those myself eventually.
I tried the home grown version before I got my d-roller, and to be frank, it sucked. It was extremely difficult (if not impossible) to get the plastic films wrinkle free and the thing attracted dog hair like crazy. Not useful at all :(
Neil
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Neil,
Your two expressions run together.
Were both the homemade version and the real deal both bad? I'm pretty sure you just meant the homemade version?
Thanks
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Well, at least I have some leads now. This forum is awesome!!
Too bad the inventor or manufacturer didn't research his/her adhesives better. I don't want to put staples though mine. I'm way too anal retentive to live with that .... LOL. But thanks for the suggestion. It gets me thinking though. Would a small piece of strong adhesive tape work at the roller end of the rubber strip? I might give that a try.
I wish that the plastic sheet was longer. How will I de-curl panorama prints?
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Go to your local Home Despot and buy a pull down type window blind. This is way long enough for panoramas. Get a 3" cardboard tube. Cut the vinyl off the roller of the blind so you only have the length of vinyl. Lay the blind out enough so you can over lap about 3" of it over the end of the print. Then proceed to roll this onto the 3" tube.
Tape the vinyl end to hold it closed or you could get a large rubber band around it. You only need it rolled long enough to reverse the curve in the print.
When I get a poster in that has been tightly rolled, I reverse roll it onto a 3" tube and then stick it into a 4" tube and let it sit there for a bit. This is usually enough to let me work with so I can tack it for dry mounting.
Hope this makes sense.
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Go to your local Home Despot and buy a pull down type window blind. This is way long enough for panoramas. Get a 3" cardboard tube. Cut the vinyl off the roller of the blind so you only have the length of vinyl. Lay the blind out enough so you can over lap about 3" of it over the end of the print. Then proceed to roll this onto the 3" tube.
Tape the vinyl end to hold it closed or you could get a large rubber band around it. You only need it rolled long enough to reverse the curve in the print.
When I get a poster in that has been tightly rolled, I reverse roll it onto a 3" tube and then stick it into a 4" tube and let it sit there for a bit. This is usually enough to let me work with so I can tack it for dry mounting.
Hope this makes sense.
Sure does and I was thinking the same thing this morning as I looked at the shades on my patio door. They are the pull down type and the roller is 1.5 inches which is slightly larger than the D-Roller as I see by the specifications. I don't know why one of these wouldn't work. They are cheap and you can have them cut to almost any width and length and available at most hardware stores. Here is a super big size for $7 US: http://www.acehardware.com/product/index.jsp?productId=3687878&CAWELAID=360567496 ;)
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A roll down blind for panoramas .... good idea. I might try to adhere (or maybe not) a rubberized strip along the two sides (like on the D-roller). As someone said in an earlier post, those strips add a small amount of space between each roll of the tube .... so the paper isn't rolled so tightly.
No one has said anything about trying to secure the rubber strips on the D-roller. The tape might be enough to hold the rubber strips in place.
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FWIW I made my own out of PVC pipe and some painters canvas. Cost about $15.
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FWIW I made my own out of PVC pipe and some painters canvas. Cost about $15.
Once for all.
To make a construction that looks like the DeRoller, isn't the same that it works like a DeRoller.
I've tried several home made items with some decurling effects. But nothing come close to the original
patented construction. You actually have to try one to understand the big difference,
/Sven
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Neil,
Your two expressions run together.
Were both the homemade version and the real deal both bad? I'm pretty sure you just meant the homemade version?
Thanks
Yes, sorry. Homemade version. I finally caved and bought the real deal and have no complaints. I shouldn't have wasted my time on the DIY version.
Neil
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Once for all.
To make a construction that looks like the DeRoller, isn't the same that it works like a DeRoller.
I've tried several home made items with some decurling effects. But nothing come close to the original
patented construction. You actually have to try one to understand the big difference,
/Sven
I did and made mine appropriately. It has served me well for 5 years.
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I did and made mine appropriately. It has served me well for 5 years.
And you get a 24"x30" print flat in 30 s?
Maybe you can do some earnings on your construction ;)
/Sven
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And you get a 24"x30" print flat in 30 s?
/Sven
Not a PhotoRag 310 gsm or similar. And I wouldn't want to either. If people describe cracks in the coating of HM Photorag Baryta due to low humidity there should be some concern about decurling thick papers fast. For larger print runs I rather keep the images on the roll and reverse roll them up underneath the printer on 6" carton cores. To cut them 12-24 hours later. The smallest decurl core I want to use is 2" and then for thinner papers.
met vriendelijke groeten, Ernst
New: Spectral plots of +250 inkjet papers:
http://www.pigment-print.com/spectralplots/spectrumviz_1.htm
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I was just forced to make mine because shipping will cost me more than the original stuff.
I made several versions, they all works fine.
I use various kinds of soft plastic like PVC or the kind that you put on the kitchen floor (I don't know name in English), and cover material with some kind of inkjet substrate like HP tracing paper or HP vellum, therefore the printed surface come in contact with clean material that is also supposed to be used for printing.
I made several different constructions with different diameters of core.
First I used cardboard core from the paper roll it works fine at the begging of the roll, but need more time to de-roll when paper approach its end. It was 2 inch core = 5 cm.
For second construction I used cardboard core that has 4 cm, that works great on all degrees of curling.
I tested core that was 2 cm in diameter, it was too extreme and some papers got strips like it was bent over the edge of table - but it did not crack picture layer or destroy it or made any other harm to the image itself. I don't use this construction any more.
Than I made one without core with soft PVC - this is miracle - it works in the second with any kind of paper in any curl - but you need to be very gentle with pressure. Because there is no core it is possible to bend paper if you put to much pressure on it, just gently roll the paper and it is flat. Due to lack of hard core it is possible to adjust diameter so it is very useful for all degrees of curl, and all kind of material. My favourite construction. I just glue HP tracing paper on each side of PVC in the way that layer on which it is supposed to be printed is outside.
At the end I can say that I save a lot of money, learn a lot about mechanic strength and resistance of various papers and have some fun with my leftovers from calibrations, but the main point is that it works very well.
Of course I can change my mind if I have opportunity to work with the original, but I doubt it.
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And you get a 24"x30" print flat in 30 s?
Maybe you can do some earnings on your construction ;)
/Sven
Sure. This is not rocket science. Why I made mine? A friend owned the 24" and loaned it to me. It worked great, but I wanted to do larger prints. I had some PVC laying around and thought-how hard can this be? It wasn't.
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Today, Oct. 21, 2018 I just learned of this product.
Am I the only chap on the planet that thinks $282.95 today at B&H for this device is robbery??!!
And you're telling me it begins to fall apart and you are trying to resolve the issue yourself rather than finding strong product support behind it?
Now, I print on 325gm roll paper, and yes, getting the roll out of it is a bitch.
But come on, it would be overpriced at $99.00, but acceptable and I'd buy it.
I'm half tempted to see if this is "product" is really patented, and if so, when it expires.
This thing needs some real competition as it is failing on being "fairly priced" and properly supported by the manufacturer.
Just my "rant" for the day.