HP cutter issue reading registration mark #2

[jimbug72]

We have an HP 315 and an HP Latex 54 Plus Cutter using Flexi. When doing print/cut procedures, we occasionally seem to have an issue with the cutter reading the 2nd registration mark. Reads the barcode just fine, then reads the fist registration mark just fine but it will start to look in the wrong place for the 2nd cropmark. It's far enough off the mark that it will never find it (it starts looking about 4" or so above where the mark is.) Once we "forced" it to look in the correct place, but it when it started cutting, it was waaaay off of where it was supposed to be cutting.

As far as we can tell, it seems to be completely random, and thankfully not super common. Very frustrating though, especially when it happens on large prints.

Any ideas?

 

[balstestrat]

Next time try to turn it 180° I think usually it makes the marks with standard distance say 15" but the last one can be less say 11".
Barcode should always turn it correct way but say you for some reason sent it manually from the cut queue it could be it.

Another is if you have it on a roll and autoload is turned off, then it doesn't unload it before reading the marks and could jump a little. Dirty grit rollers make it happen as well.

 

[jimbug72]

Next time try to turn it 180° I think usually it makes the marks with standard distance say 15" but the last one can be less say 11".
Barcode should always turn it correct way but say you for some reason sent it manually from the cut queue it could be it.

Another is if you have it on a roll and autoload is turned off, then it doesn't unload it before reading the marks and could jump a little. Dirty grit rollers make it happen as well.

Thanks for the response.

We've tried flipping and loading it with the same result. We pretty much never put them back on a roll.

I don't think it's a feed issue, because it consistently overshoots the mark by about 4 to 5 inches, but the prints aren't distorted. It often happens on the second registration mark, but not always (sometimes it's the 3rd or 4th mark). The print that prompted me to post on Friday, the guy working on it tried clearing the cache in Flexi, then reloading the same file & had the same issue. He saved the file in another location under another file name, same issue. Removed some text in the file (not live text, but converted to outlines) and it ran without issue. What makes it even more weird, there were other files with the text, using the same original file but with different color setups that ran without issue. It happens when we use the barcode, or when we send manually from Flexi.

Might be worth mentioning that we design in Illustrator, print/cut from Flexi.

 

[jimbug72]

The issue is likely seems to be Flexi software misinterpreting crop marks—try re-calibrating the cutter and ensuring proper lighting.

It seems software related to me, rather than an optical or feed issue. The marks appear to be consistently spaced every time, meaning none seem to be in the "wrong" place. When it happens, the sensor overshoots the mark every time, by seemingly the same amount every time and starts looking for the mark about 4-5 inches above where the mark actually is. It usually overshoots the second mark from the beginning, but it has been the 3rd mark a few times, and even a 4th mark before. Sending from barcode or manually sending from Flexi makes no difference.

It's the seemingly complete randomness that's the head scratcher. It seems to me that if it were a calibration issue there would be at least some consistency. The one that got us Friday, 2 files, both copied/pasted from the same original layout. Both were the same size. The only difference between the two was literally just the fill/stroke swatch colors. One print/cut w/o issue. The other had the issue. We cleared the cache, loaded and sent it through again. Same issue. We tried saving the file under a new name in a different location, same issue. Deleted the text (converted to outlines, not live type) from the file and it worked.

 

[mtpzone]

Production manager and Flexi itself have become out of sync in terms of the jobs properties. You can test this simply, Create small print/cut job in flexi and send it to the printer but DO NOT CLOSE the FLEXI RIP window. wait for the print to finish and and put it in the cutter and let it read the barcode and you will most likely get what you originally described where it can only read the first mark and the second mark is missed either short or long. this proves that production manager is not on the same page with settings as your flexi. you can cut it just fine buy going to FLEXI ( which you left open and the RIP window you DID NOT CLOSE) now in the cutter tab choose "contour cut only" and click send. Your cutter will ask you to put the tool over the first mark.. do that and your job will cut fine

 

[jimbug72]

Production manager and Flexi itself have become out of sync in terms of the jobs properties. You can test this simply, Create small print/cut job in flexi and send it to the printer but DO NOT CLOSE the FLEXI RIP window. wait for the print to finish and and put it in the cutter and let it read the barcode and you will most likely get what you originally described where it can only read the first mark and the second mark is missed either short or long. this proves that production manager is not on the same page with settings as your flexi. you can cut it just fine buy going to FLEXI ( which you left open and the RIP window you DID NOT CLOSE) now in the cutter tab choose "contour cut only" and click send. Your cutter will ask you to put the tool over the first mark.. do that and your job will cut fine

This makes sense. Thanks for the tip, mptzone! I will let production staff know to be sure and leave that window open on ALL print/cut jobs and report back next time this issue arises.

 

[mtpzone]

Make a note also that sometimes Production manager just seems to decide to take over a particular property value and not others. I don't fully understand why or when. but I recently had another similar issue where in FLEXI i needed to set the "eliminate line segment overlap" as well as some other settings to get thru some crappy art given by customer. When it cut it i could see the cutter going over and over certain lines even though i had it set to eliminate. and was using the flexi settings and not the production manager settings. I reloaded the project. It was still set.. i ran it again. same thing. I decided to check Production manager and YUP it was not checked in production manager and even though all my other settings from FLEXI were being observed. the line segment overlap was being overridden by production manager. It doesn't happen often. but once it does I make those project files as corrupt and don't use them again because anything can happen. Just start new and then its most likely always fine. Im on 22.0.3 there are probably a few updates i should try but those always bring new problems you have to discover and get around.. so i tend to stick to what works with the least problems.

 

[jimbug72]

Update: (I wasn't in the office when it happened) It happened again Thursday after I left. The production person said they'd left the Flexi RIP window open, changed it to output "contour only" but it still tried to look in the wrong location. I'd really hoped that was the solution! Oh well, back to the drawing board. We are currently saving everything as .eps files to see if that makes a difference. So far there've been no issues, but sometimes we go weeks without this occurring. We were previously using .ai and .pdf files.

 

[mtpzone]

OK but did they SEND it from FLEXI or did the SEND it to PRODUCTION MANAGER.. they needed to SEND from FLEXI.. ie did they do a barcode Workflow or did they SEND FROM FLEXI.. the CUTTER asked to put tool over first mark and then cut..

 

[jimbug72]

Definitely sent it from Flexi, and NOT from PM. She left the RIP window open in Flexi and after it failed after the barcode procedure, went to the Flexi RIP window, changed "send:" to "Contour Job Only" and clicked send from that same Flexi RIP window, it again went to the same "wrong" place on the 2nd mark.

I really thought that would be the fix. It makes the most sense. In that Flexi RIP window, we can see where it assigns the mark placement in the little preview portion of the window, so by leaving out the transfer to PM & the barcode procedure and sending it directly from the RIP engine that assigned the mark placement, it seems like it should know EXACTLY where to go to find the next mark.

We can't seem to find any common denominator within the files that we could point to as a problem.

 

[balstestrat]

Definitely sent it from Flexi, and NOT from PM. She left the RIP window open in Flexi and after it failed after the barcode procedure, went to the Flexi RIP window, changed "send:" to "Contour Job Only" and clicked send from that same Flexi RIP window, it again went to the same "wrong" place on the 2nd mark.

I really thought that would be the fix. It makes the most sense. In that Flexi RIP window, we can see where it assigns the mark placement in the little preview portion of the window, so by leaving out the transfer to PM & the barcode procedure and sending it directly from the RIP engine that assigned the mark placement, it seems like it should know EXACTLY where to go to find the next mark.

We can't seem to find any common denominator within the files that we could point to as a problem.

I don't think you completely understand how it works. PM is the RIP. Flexi is merely connecting to PM and forwarding everything to it.
PM will still RIP, process and print it. Flexi won't do anything without PM.

 

[jimbug72]

I don't think you completely understand how it works. PM is the RIP. Flexi is merely connecting to PM and forwarding everything to it.
PM will still RIP, process and print it. Flexi won't do anything without PM.

Got it. Granted I don't fully understand RIPs and I believe it was more of a vernacular misunderstanding that anything else. My labels of the software were based on mtpzone's suggestion, "Create small print/cut job in flexi and send it to the printer but DO NOT CLOSE the FLEXI RIP window"

Correct me if I'm wrong, I'm pretty sure I got the gist of what MTP was suggesting and we did as they suggested, which was to attempt to bypass Production Manager in the contour cut portion of the process.

Vernacular pedantry aside, we still need to get to sort out what is happening and how to correct it. Unless of course, it isn't vernacular pedantry and I'm misunderstanding what mtpsozne was suggesting and took the wrong steps. If that is the case, please enlighten me.

P.S. My apologies if this reads as snarky. No snark was intended.

 

[mtpzone]

HP flexi rip/print seems to get something corrupted every now and then where regardless of you choosing the "use flexi or use production manager" settings that pop up when doing a print/cut, it will just override whatever you have set in flexi with what is the Production manager default. This only happen when using the barcode workflow. it never effects the print itsefl only the cut pass.. ie.. you have a default set in production manager for 6" min marker setting in production manager but in flexi you have it set to 5" min for a particular job. the dialog pops up.. and you know you changed so you choose to use the flexi settings.

If you send that.. print it.. then load it in cutter and go for the barcode workflow.. if your production manager is corrupt it will FORCE the 6" marker setting even thought the barcode should be using all the settings you had set in flexi. you will see it read the barcode. .get the first marker then go about 1" PAST the first marker and start making the bigger and bigger circles trying to find it. you can even remove and insert that sheet backwards and try the reverse barcode if you printed it and prove that its not looking in the actual location it printed it.. Now if you left flexi open. you can go to the rip/print dialoge.. select send contour cut only.. and hit set.. YES its sends it to prodcution manager.. but it send what you asked it to send this time. and cuts it fine.. just not via barcode.

what causes this corruption? that i have never figured out.. but i have the habit now of.... after hitting send on every job. I screenshot the settings of the rip and print for the layout and the cutting settings and the OPOS setting. then maybe i don't get to that print for a few hours or a day or 5 jobs later etc.. and it can't find the marks. then i just find that screenshot.. and make sure i set all those settings. hit send contour only and it prints them fine.

If someone can explain why that happens sometimes I will try anything.. usually re-install works right away.. but i believe its a bug.. i print a lot of stickers and never like to print more then 48" length to keep the registration tight. i might print 6 sets or 10 sets and sometimes when cutting the 3rd one can't find the mark. and from then on the other 7 are screwed. or maybe the last 2 will be fine..

As i mentioned before.. this is the ONLY thing i can complain about in HP FLEXI right now so im not doing any upgrades till i see a upgrade note that says it fixes this specifically. The previous version didn't seem to have this problem but had a few other issues that were resolved so I will stick with this version for now.

Back in these forums you see other with this same exact issue so its clearly a "THING"
sorry for the long post.

 

[jimbug72]

HP flexi rip/print seems to get something corrupted every now and then where regardless of you choosing the "use flexi or use production manager" settings that pop up when doing a print/cut, it will just override whatever you have set in flexi with what is the Production manager default. This only happen when using the barcode workflow. it never effects the print itsefl only the cut pass.. ie.. you have a default set in production manager for 6" min marker setting in production manager but in flexi you have it set to 5" min for a particular job. the dialog pops up.. and you know you changed so you choose to use the flexi settings.

If you send that.. print it.. then load it in cutter and go for the barcode workflow.. if your production manager is corrupt it will FORCE the 6" marker setting even thought the barcode should be using all the settings you had set in flexi. you will see it read the barcode. .get the first marker then go about 1" PAST the first marker and start making the bigger and bigger circles trying to find it. you can even remove and insert that sheet backwards and try the reverse barcode if you printed it and prove that its not looking in the actual location it printed it.. Now if you left flexi open. you can go to the rip/print dialoge.. select send contour cut only.. and hit set.. YES its sends it to prodcution manager.. but it send what you asked it to send this time. and cuts it fine.. just not via barcode.

what causes this corruption? that i have never figured out.. but i have the habit now of.... after hitting send on every job. I screenshot the settings of the rip and print for the layout and the cutting settings and the OPOS setting. then maybe i don't get to that print for a few hours or a day or 5 jobs later etc.. and it can't find the marks. then i just find that screenshot.. and make sure i set all those settings. hit send contour only and it prints them fine.

If someone can explain why that happens sometimes I will try anything.. usually re-install works right away.. but i believe its a bug.. i print a lot of stickers and never like to print more then 48" length to keep the registration tight. i might print 6 sets or 10 sets and sometimes when cutting the 3rd one can't find the mark. and from then on the other 7 are screwed. or maybe the last 2 will be fine..

As i mentioned before.. this is the ONLY thing i can complain about in HP FLEXI right now so im not doing any upgrades till i see a upgrade note that says it fixes this specifically. The previous version didn't seem to have this problem but had a few other issues that were resolved so I will stick with this version for now.

Back in these forums you see other with this same exact issue so its clearly a "THING"
sorry for the long post.

I've stumbled across the issue on this, at least for our machine. I don't know why it's using two separate measurements in Flexi because it seems to be completely random. Most larger jobs do fine, but the occasional random one starts looking a few inches past the mark. Flexi was using two separate MAX distances between marks. I'm attaching pics of our setup for reference, but here's the gist:


In HP Flexi in the "Rip & Print" window, under the cutter tab, in the registration mark area click the "options" button. Copy, or make note of the number in the "Maximum distance between marks" field.
Then, in the "Rip & Print" window, at the top left click the properties button, under the "Registration Marks" tab, click the options button. Paste or type the same number from the previous step.
Close that out, then in the "Send:" drop down menu, set it to "Contour Jobs Only" then click send and follow prompts to move the tool over the mark. It should start cutting in the correct place from there.

 

[mtpzone]

Yes. that difference between PRODUCTION MANAGER and FLEXI gets out of lock step for no apparent reason.. As mentioned if i run 6 batches.. all could be fine or 1 or more can suddenly have a different setting. Didn't used to do this in prev versions. so somewhere along the line this bug was introduced. I have conditioned my self to just screenshot the settings for any larger jobs that require more then just the 1 run. that way i can just match those settings and manually send that cut file from flexi. The good things is that you don't loose or ruin any prints!