Mimaki jv400-160LX COLOR FADING OUT IN PRINTS

[Mimakijv400]

I am having an issue with the Mimaki JV400-160 during prints as it is fading the colors in/out during prints. Has anyone else had this issue or know what is causing this?

Thanks!

 

[Dark Fox]

not a fade out

That doesn't look like a fade-out to me. It looks like your machine is dropping one of the jets.

After your "fade-out" happens, run a jet test. You'll be able to see which one is failing.

It could be a dirty jet, head, print head. Whatever you call it on your machine.
You should also check the caps. Are they actually cleaning? Or are they dirty too.
Dirty cappers can deposit whatever they have on them onto your print heads.

This would be your starting point.
If not, then it gets more complicated.

 

[TKD]

We are having exact the same problem especially when printing solid one color areas.

We also have a quality problem with printing CAUTION stickers that have yellow on background and black text / illustrations. The black text is not very sharp.
This started suddenly. we have allmost perfect test print (the black is missin a couple of lines) but our MIMAKI supplier said it cannot be the problem to cause this.
They have not yet solved this problem..

 

[TKD]

All problems go away IF i turn Quality to 1200x1200 and 36 passes.. But the time it takes to print out something with these settings.. Ugh..
Maybe the couple of lines of black missing in the test print can cause all this..

 

[Solventinkjet]

The fact that the problem goes away when you go to higher passes means it's an ink flow issue for sure. I know that machine uses the Ricoh heads but I am not sure if it uses the sub tank system that other Ricoh heads use. If it does, you probably just need to replace it.