HP 9000s print quality issues

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Hi guys, Im a bit new here and new to solvent printing. I just picked up this 9000s. When I picked it up the guy I purchased from did a test print for me so I could confirm it was in good working order. The test print came out great and I was satisfied. After getting to the shop and getting everything set up I cant seam to reproduce those results. I have heavy light colored banding on all colors. I have tried everything in the book to remedy the situation with only very small improvements.

Things I have tried.
-change print heat
-change print direction
-change print quality/ passes
-many ph cleanings
-did all the calibrations available
-did an overnight ph wash

But even after all of that my iq prints look awful. Im currently printing on arlon wrap vinyl but i was getting the same results on the banner material given to me with the printer (same material the test print was printed on). Is it possible that something was damaged in transit? Am I just looking at getting new print heads?

Any suggestions are much appreciated. Ive wasted a lot of material and time so Im pretty much open to anything at this point.

 

[Kwiksigns]

Sorry I can't help you out... I used to have that same printer and I have installed many prints from people who had those printers... And banding like that was a very common thing. Nobody ever wanted to get print heads for the thing, cyan ALWAYS dropped out, head strikes and it wasn't all that fast. We sold ours for $5k and as far as i've heard, that guy threw it out. My hatred for that printer runs deep.

 

[Sign_Something]

Sorry I can't help you out... I used to have that same printer and I have installed many prints from people who had those printers... And banding like that was a very common thing. Nobody ever wanted to get print heads for the thing, cyan ALWAYS dropped out, head strikes and it wasn't all that fast. We sold ours for $5k and as far as i've heard, that guy threw it out. My hatred for that printer runs deep.

Thanks for the reply. I would consider the banding as normal or expected if I didn't just physically witness a perfect print come from this machine a few days ago.

 

[danno]

Have you attempted an actual print? The units we had would leave an IQ print similar to what you have shown, but print very well on actual jobs.

 

[Robert Gruner]

Sign something,

Your HP 9000 was built by Seiko (ColorPainter). The print-heads are very expensive and they require a "special alignment tool" for proper head alignment.

If all your heads are firing properly and the heads are properly aligned, you can generate high quality digital prints with no banding.

I would suggest you look for a service tech in your area who has specific knowledge working on either HP9000 or Seiko ColorPainter.

If you need to replace 2 or more print-heads, I would suggest you consider scrapping the printer and purchase something like the HP Latex110 or Latex 310 for around $10K.

Good printing

 

[Sign_Something]

Have you attempted an actual print? The units we had would leave an IQ print similar to what you have shown, but print very well on actual jobs.

I have not. I figured getting the test print good was the first step. I will give this a try asap.

 

[Sign_Something]

Sign something,

Your HP 9000 was built by Seiko (ColorPainter). The print-heads are very expensive and they require a "special alignment tool" for proper head alignment.

If all your heads are firing properly and the heads are properly aligned, you can generate high quality digital prints with no banding.

I would suggest you look for a service tech in your area who has specific knowledge working on either HP9000 or Seiko ColorPainter.

If you need to replace 2 or more print-heads, I would suggest you consider scrapping the printer and purchase something like the HP Latex110 or Latex 310 for around $10K.

Good printing

Yea, I picked this one up for a steal of a deal so I wanted to at least learn from it. I already planned to upgrade in the near future. Was just hopping to at least get a few jobs on this one.

 

[Sign_Something]

I finally made some progress today with the IQ test print. After uping the voltage to the print heads I saw great improvements. Its still not near what I want but it did improve. Im still not sure where to go from here though. Not sure if the piece of info is useful to anyone or not...