Are printers ok in hot weather?

[datack]

Hi guys,

I was hoping that someone from another hot country might be able to chime in here and just put my mind at ease that modern printers are ok in temperatures that are above the "operational temperatures" listed on spec sheets.

Essentially, I live in Perth Western Australia where the summer time temps can quite often exceed the operational temps of the printers I've been looking at purchasing. Those are the Epson P800, Epson P5000 (it's called the P5070 in Oz for some reason) or the Canon Pro 1000.

When I look at the Epson website for the P800 as an example the specs say:
Operational Temp   10° to 35° C (15-25° C recommended)
Operational Humidity   20 to 80% with no condensation (40-60% recommended)

Now in Perth we can have many days in a rows where the day time temp is 35+... sometimes even getting upwards of 40°C to 43°C for a few days in a row. And where I would be storing this printer would be in an upstairs room where the temps are often a few degrees higher again as the heat gets caught upstairs in our house.

We have air conditioning, but of course for a lot of the time during the day I'm at work so it's not on.

So my questions are, are the printers listed ok in these sort of temps for days at a time (35°C to 43°C or 95°F to 110°F)? Am I likely to run into issues at all with the machine or with the prints? And is there any one of these printers that people know handle ambient heat better than the others?

I'm assuming other people here live in hot climates so it would be good to know how they handle it.

I sort of assume that they would be fine as the spec sheets are usually a bit on the conservative side. I know I've used my Canon 6D camera fine in -30°C (-22°F) and it certainly doesn't list that cold on the spec sheet. The camera was just a bit slow and ripped through the battery!

Cheers,
Duncan

[David Budd]

Duncan...as a "Perthite" my experience over the years of running large format printers is to always keep the printer switched on in "sleep mode", allowing the printer to  do its normal scheduled maintenance checks ie; nozzles checks etc.

During hot periods I print a daily test pattern that utilises all the ink colors, using a "low cost paper"

The more you use the printer, especially in a dry climate like Western Australia, the less likely you are to suffer a print head clog.

-David

[datack]

Thanks David.

Glad to know that it should be fine as long as I just do a bit of maintenance.
This week would be a good test seeing as from tomorrow the forecast is 35-40°C for the entire week!

Cheers,
Duncan

[Ferp]

My understanding is that humidity is more important than temperature per se.  The most commonly expressed view is that you want to maintain humidity above 40% in order to prevent or minimize clogs.