Wide smooth banding on 4880 anyone seen this before? Even on other Epson models?

[nairb]

I've been trying to figure out a problem that's been occurring with my 4880 since some time in the spring. I first noticed it in the attached test print with the metre stick at the top. That print is 16"x36". This image from my phone exaggerates the effect a little bit, but it is always visible in smooth tones of colour like skies. The bands are each roughly an inch wide.





I've now gone through 90% of a roll of Ilford premium lustre paper doing test prints trying to determine what it might be. I had an initial conversation with Epson about it this past week in which a tech named Jim, who seemed quite experienced said that what I was describing sounded like a hardware issue rather than something in software. He gave me the number of an authorized repair company in Calgary who I called right away. After having a not so good impression of this persons abilities/experience and after coming up with some other ideas about what it might be I was on the phone with Epson again for a couple hours doing test prints with different paper settings and different profiles and different colour settings.

They immediately thought it was a paper or profile issue as I have been using third party products, However I was able to get my hands on two sheets of Epson ultra premium lustre and using Epson profiles, was able to reproduce the effect on their media, although it did appear to be a fair bit less pronounced.

They had me do prints at the 1440 setting (or 4) instead of 2880 (or 5) at which I usually print and the wide smooth bands were not apparent at the lower setting. I suspect that the lower quality may just be masking the effects.

I've done the testing on Ilford Gold Fibre silk (17x40 roll and 13x19 sheet), Ilford premium lustre, and a couple sheets of Epson ultra premium lustre and always see the effect at the 2880 setting no matter what paper I'm using.

I spent the weekend testing on a different windows 7 computer printing from Corel instead of CS5, as well as on a macbook pro running osx 10.8.3 and all of them exhibited the wide banding. I also tried using different USB cables.

I usually set the platen gap to wide when printing on the GFS.

I've been using the GFS since I got the printer 4 years ago and never noticed the problem until late april I think it was.

I'd inquired if it might be due to having updated the firmware around the time I first noticed the problem, but the one tech I was in contact with on Friday after Jim hasd left doubted this would be the cause. I'm still a little skeptical of this as I understand firmware can do some wacky things outside of what it was designed to fix.

I asked if it might have been due to a windows 7 update I did in mid march as this did some wacky things to my OS, but again they didn't think so.


So if this is a hardware issue, has anyone seen it or dealt with repairing it at all?

One thing Jim tossed out was potentially a feed mechanism issue. But all the details in the images look as they should and I suspect a feed issue might effect these details.

The last I spoke with the authorized repair guy, he had no idea what it might be and said that they might just have to start changing parts which could have it out of commission for a month or more.



Thanks

Brian

[nairb]

If anyone's seen this sort of issue on other Epson models besides the 4880 it might help to diagnose what's wrong.

Thanks

[Wayne Fox]

tough one, never really seen it.  Instinct seems to indicate something is sort of worn out or not functioning correctly such as motors or perhaps rollers.  What's it like if you use 1440, but enable super microweave?  I would suspect it would look more like when you printed at 2880.

have you tried a head alignment? (and if so did you use the correct paper?)

[nairb]

I did a couple of head alignments a couple weeks ago. First on regular 8.5x11 office paper, then from my roll of 17" Ilford luster paper. Is there a special paper you're supposed to use? If there is, I had not realized this.

If there isn't, is there a particular Epson paper that would be good to keep around for doing tests, alignments, etc. Especially for someone who doesn't regularly use Epson papers?

I haven't tried 1440 with super micro weave on. I might give that a try with the last of my test roll.

Epson tech's seem to think that it might be a paper feed issue. I just got off the phone with the repair person in Calgary and doing that adjustment he said requires special Epson software.

I'm still debating whether I should bring it to get looked at on the way to buying the 9880 this afternoon or tomorrow, or waiting till I have the 9880 set up so I can do comparison tests between the two.

[nairb]

I've just tried doing the 1440 with Microweave = Super, but in the windows 7 print dialogue, there is no option to change the microweave setting.

- at a quality of 5, microweave = Super

- at a quality of 4, microweave = On

- at a quality of 3, microweave = Super

I've tried changing all these microweave settings but cannot it seems, even though my cursor will go in the box where it says "Super".

[nairb]

So I did another print at 16x16 on 17x17" paper at a quality of 3 where the super microweave setting happens, and couldn't see the wide smooth banding, but could see very fine banding (~1mm wide) through the sky due to the lower quality setting. I see this fine banding at 1440 as well, but it's slightly less apparent at this quality, and at 2880 it cannot be seen.

But for some reason another idea popped into my head. These test images have always been a 16x16" image with a canvas size of 17x17", using a paper size of 17x17" from a 17" roll. So I took out a ruler and the first print I measured, the image was 15 15/16 x 15 15/16. I pulled another different image out to my giant stack of test prints (this was a different, blue sky image) and the image size was 16 x 15 15/16 (maybe a hair more than 15/16).

So I've just done another test on Ilford GFS 13x19 paper using all their profiles. This time though I did something I don't normally do. I left the image at 12x18 exactly, did not increase the canvas size, and chose a paper size of 13x19. The resulting print was 12 x a hair over 17 15/16.

I might do the same now with an image that according to photoshop should be exactly 16x16"

EDIT

It's funny, I was having a problem at the printing company I use in the city with 24x36" prints this past winter. It was a vertical image, but was being printed on a 9900 sideways on 44" paper. So the top of the image was on the left side of the printer and bottom was on the right. The problem was that the prints were coming out roughly 1/16 narrower than 24" at the top and and a little more than 1/16 wider than 24" at the bottom.

2nd edit

forgot to mention that the 12x18 print did indeed have the smooth banding in the sky.

[nairb]

So the test with the 16"x16" image with a paper size of 17"x17" resulted in an image measuring 16" (along the print head path) x 15 & just a hair over 15/16 along the papers feed path.

So it appears that Jim the Epson guy may have been right in that this appears to be a paper feed issue.

I should note too that the wide smooth banding was present in this print, as usual it's parallel to the print head's path. I had used Ilford premium lustre paper with ilfords suggested paper and profile settings.

So I guess I'll be bringing the printer to the city to get repaired in the morning.

Thanks for everyone's assistance.

Brian

[nairb]

Just out of curiosity regarding an earlier question in the thread.

Can anyone recommend an Epson paper that would be good for doing printer testing with?

My first instinct would be to just get a roll of their premium lustre as it seems to be cheap and readily available (initially I'd avoided this product because it was only available in 16" rolls when all the other manufacturers offered 17" rolls), but perhaps others have a better idea.

Or perhaps even a suggestion for an Epson paper that would be a good substitute for Ilford Gold Fibre Silk for doing my final prints?

[darlingm]

Using the high speed option?  If so, try turning it off.  (Doesn't sound like this is the cause to me, but would rather mention it than not.)

[Rand47]

I've never had anything like this on my 4880, except when I had a partially clogged nozzle.  Unlike my other printers, where a missing color makes a really ugly and obviously clogged-nozzle-print, on my 4880 I sometimes just get this kind of effect, or something that just looks like a slight color shift.  When I first got the printer I pulled my hair out the first time it happened ... double checked all my print settings, ICC profile, etc. and after wasting a bunch of paper finally decided to do a nozzle check test print.  Doh!  Have you ruled this out?

Rand

[nairb]

So I've been at the repair place doing tests after he used epsons utility to adjust the paper feed through software.

Unfortunately the wide bands are not apparent on Epson Enhanced matte photo paper which is apparently epsons approved paper for testing, but it did still show up on the last of my ilford premium luster. Which probably means it'll show on gold fibre silk. Which I use for my prints

[elliot_n]

I recently saw similar banding on prints from my Epson 3800 on Epson Premium Lustre. The same file printed on Harman Gloss FB showed no banding. So for the time being I'm blaming it on a bad batch of Epson paper (and perhaps the unusually warm/humid UK weather).