Edge FX print issues

[bubs]

Hi all,

Been using the edge FX for quite a few years now but recently it's started printing a line of colour when the foil starts printing. For example the print will feed the vinyl through until the place to start printing and it will create a thin line of the colour before the printed piece. There's also been a couple of times in the last week where the foil hasn't tensioned correctly and comes out the front of the edge along with the vinyl. Happens on different foils and different materials so I'm thinking there's a possibility these are both a mechanical issue with the roll up tensioner.

Anyone else had this?

 

[FunkotronXL]

Hi all,

Been using the edge FX for quite a few years now but recently it's started printing a line of colour when the foil starts printing. For example the print will feed the vinyl through until the place to start printing and it will create a thin line of the colour before the printed piece. There's also been a couple of times in the last week where the foil hasn't tensioned correctly and comes out the front of the edge along with the vinyl. Happens on different foils and different materials so I'm thinking there's a possibility these are both a mechanical issue with the roll up tensioner.

Anyone else had this?

The line at the start is usually caused by the printhead's warmup sequence prior to printing, if it is before your prints and not causing excess loss of material it should be of no consequence. It also indicates towards the issue listed below:

Your foil tension issue and foil coming out the front of the edge sounds like a foil drive failure. Possibly a failure of the foil motor, forward/reverse clutch, or pinched cable somewhere in the foil drive system. Have fun if you swap the clutches, much harder to access versus the older Edge II models.

 

[bubs]

Thanks for the reply. Unfortunately the line of print appears just before each colour starts to print, ie when the head goes down. So i get a line of colour at the start (when the head first initialises) the head goes back up then the vinyl will roll on until the area where the colour is due to print then as the head comes down and starts to print I get another line of colour, this one obviously now ruins the job.
It doesn't seem to matter which colour it is (although i've not seen it on black yet) which is why i'm suspecting a drive/motor problem somewhere. The lines also seem to be pressed into the vinyl, possibly the head is coming down just a fraction to far on occasion?

 

[bubs]

We're still having this issue, called the engineer in and they have recommended replacing the main cable but at a cost for £700!! (£550 just for the cable)
I've opened up the sleeve and it just seems to be the foil sensor cable that's broken. What has now happened though is that the edge isn't printing the top 2 inches of a print so I assume the data cable is now dead too. Is there anywhere these are available for less that £550+vat?

Update: I think cutting the sleeve around the cables has made some of the other cables fall apart completely as It now won't even recognise the foil cartridge

 

[Joe House]

Bubs, it looks like you've had about 3 months of fighting this thing. How much has that cost you. I'd get with your engineer and go with what he recommends. Clear up your problems and be able to print with confidence and less waste.

 

[bubs]

Just to close this one, we got the engineer back to fit the new cables and it still wasn't working properly, turns out the bracket for the z axis was ever so slightly out of line causing it not to be properly read by the sensor, quick bent of that and it all seems to be Ok. If the cable had anything to do with this original problem we'll never know but the £1300+ it's cost means we're going to have to do a hell of a lot of edge printing to recoup that.

 

[michael Mahoney]

if your using the gerber edge 2 foils in a fx this may happen if you changed a foil to the new cartridge with the old sprockets this may happen
just a suggestion not implying that's what you've done