5 Printers Break in One Week...

[xanderfischer]

First of all, the 7 STEP human verification necessary to post anything is RIDICULOUS. This forum is so wonky, but very informative.

Hi, I manage a print lab, and I've dealt with all kinds of printer and scanner issues over the years, but I've recently been plagued with an epidemic that has me pretty stumped:

We print on all of our printers nearly every day, but over the course of week or so, I've had five printers suddenly exhibit very similar problems. my 11880, 9890, two 4900s and 9800 all started giving me white horizontal banding. Nozzle checks are perfect, ran head alignments (uni and bi consecutively on all) to no avail. I can get it to change, and sometimes get better with paper feed adjustments, but not disappear entirely. the 4900s have thin banding at regular intervals, although today one started out with thicker, dark bands at more irregular intervals, then turned back into thin white regular bands over time. All the printers exhibit it primarily in the shadows. the other 4900 also prints a single vertical dark band on the left side now...

Happens on rolls and sheets, though rolls seem to be worse. Also, the 9890 seems to getting better. However,  if you look closely, the dithering pattern seems to be pretty shitty and spotty, often with vertical banding to some degree.

Also, after much fiddling with feed adjustments and alignments, vertical banding became more and more apparent on the 9890 and 11880. Tried different papers, surfaces, etc, all very similar. Look at the banding though, I've never seen it appear in this sort of tapered shape. If you look closely, you can see vertical AND horizontal banding on the 9890/11880.

9800 had the least banding, but still apparent, though it seems to have gone away over the weekend, however when I came back, a huge portion of the MK nozzle check was missing, which never happens (this thing has always been an indelible workhorse). After a few cleanings it was good, and seems to be relatively stable now.

I have reinstalled the drivers, and tried everything I know how to do.

HERE'S MY THEORY... tell me what you think:


We left the lab closed for 4 days over thanksgiving, and the problems started trickling in when we got back, and gradually infected all the printers. Perhaps it got really dry for a few days, and dried out the carriage lubricant on all the printers (except for my 7900, which seems to be alright, but it's also the newest, so perhaps the lubricant is more resilient).

[xanderfischer]

Pictures

Also, head alignment seemed to mostly remedy the 11880 with premium luster, but then got like twice as bad as soon as I switched to a roll of 300gsm photo silk baryta.

Now most of the printers seem ok, or go in and out of commission, but the dithering pattern on the mural printers is not optimal (blacks are not as black as usual, and you can see the dither is not as tight as usual under loupe inspection...


Lubricant? What kind? Where?

[dgberg]

8 steps, your profile is empty.
What is your studio humidy level?

[Mark Lindquist]

Have you checked the studio outlets with a volt meter lately?

[xander fischer]

Profile is empty...? We were using correct profiles and associated settings for all of these. The humidity level is now hovering at a solid 50-60% thanks to the addition of another humidifier and it wasn't much lower during the worst of all this.

The printers are slowly becoming more and more normalized now. the banding is going away, but I would rather have an answer than a miraculous cure.

[davidh202]

Like Mark said,Line Power  fluctuations would be the only thing I could think of that would be a common denominator for all machines ?
I doubt that a few days off would cause all to dry up lube.

[Jeremy Roussak]

Profile is empty...? We were using correct profiles and associated settings for all of these.

I think he was referring to your forum profile and your complaint about the seven steps necessary to register.

Jeremy

[Jimbo57]

First of all, the 7 STEP human verification necessary to post anything is RIDICULOUS. This forum is so wonky, but very informative.

Some of us like it that way. It helps keep trolls, scammers, spammers and professionals out, making it a very friendly and helpful forum for genuine amateur photographers interested in landscape and nature photography.

[Paul2660]

The banding you are seeing on your 9890, could be from either:

paper type selection or platen gap or a combination.

For example, on Crystalline canvas on my 9900 BC calls for a platen gap of widest, paper type canvas.  If I use that I will see the same issue you have in blacks or some darker grey.  If I change to platen gap wider, and leave the paper type at canvas, no problems. 

Of course at wider, you run the risk of head strikes if the canvas has some oversize lumps, which can happen, so it's a trade off.  But the banding IMO is worse and can ruin a large print. 

Paul C

[Wayne Fox]

strange indeed, but no way it's the lubricant.

What software are you driving the printers with?  What's your typical print settings  (example dpi, etc.)

[hanzo]

I have the same issue.. albeit in a lighter degree..
after idled for months, I printed an A3 photo of woods and notice horizontal bands of color
although quite faint, but still noticeable

[xanderfischer]

strange indeed, but no way it's the lubricant.

What software are you driving the printers with?  What's your typical print settings  (example dpi, etc.)

We use photoshop and epson scan, although it did the same thing with Studioprint (albeit using the epson HTI driver plugin). We use a LOT of different print settings-- people come in nearly every day with different papers, so we switch platin/media type/mk-pk/printers all the time. I can't imagine its from any kind of lack of use. I'm going to try lubricating anyway, I feel like that needs to happen anyway, as it's never been done in the 5-8 years of continuous use. I've witnessed the effects of incorrect combinations many times, and I've never seen it do anything like this, but it's something to consider, I guess.