LeslieHartman
New Member
Hey all, first time poster but long time lurker.
I have an interesting issue that I've been experiencing with my Vanguard VT3200 Dye Sublimation Printer and I just can't figure it out. When I am printing a large format image, and it is heavily saturated in a specific ink color (say Cyan, for example), the cyan will drop almost half of the jets after about 12 passes (on a 6-pass print cycle). Same goes for Magenta, if Magenta is the majority color. Initially, we also had the same issue with Black. We double-checked to make sure negative pressure was set correctly, and had some success on preserving jet loss by increasing the de-gassing pressure, but only slightly.
What DID work, was taking the file back into Onyx and doing an overall color shift of -2% on Cyan and re-ripping that file. Once I did that, I didn't lose a single jet. However, the color was obviously different than intended. I ran some solid block color prints at 100% Cyan and 100% Magenta, and then dialed each back 1% and 2%. These are those results:
Solid Cyan 100% - 122" Print x 40" - At 100%, we got through 12 passes before significant drop out (30 jets out), at 99%, we got through 24 passes before noted drop out (13 jets out), and at 98%, the entire print completed without a single dropped jet.
Solid Magenta 100% - 122" Print x 40" - At 100%, we got through 10 passes before significant drop out (26 jets out), at 99%, we got through 31 passes before noted drop out (6 jets out), and at 98%, the entire print completed without any drop out.
While I would love to just dial back the overall color shift on everything from now on, I can't honestly do that because so much of what I print is color sensitive and PMS called matches. I'm just sort of at a loss, as are the folks at Vanguard. We've ruled out negative pressure, we've ruled out the pumps, we've ruled out the primary, secondary, and de-gassing filters, and we've ruled out de-gassing pressure. I'm not sure what else would cause such a massive drop out over 2% increase in ink output.
Any suggestions would really be appreciated.
I have an interesting issue that I've been experiencing with my Vanguard VT3200 Dye Sublimation Printer and I just can't figure it out. When I am printing a large format image, and it is heavily saturated in a specific ink color (say Cyan, for example), the cyan will drop almost half of the jets after about 12 passes (on a 6-pass print cycle). Same goes for Magenta, if Magenta is the majority color. Initially, we also had the same issue with Black. We double-checked to make sure negative pressure was set correctly, and had some success on preserving jet loss by increasing the de-gassing pressure, but only slightly.
What DID work, was taking the file back into Onyx and doing an overall color shift of -2% on Cyan and re-ripping that file. Once I did that, I didn't lose a single jet. However, the color was obviously different than intended. I ran some solid block color prints at 100% Cyan and 100% Magenta, and then dialed each back 1% and 2%. These are those results:
Solid Cyan 100% - 122" Print x 40" - At 100%, we got through 12 passes before significant drop out (30 jets out), at 99%, we got through 24 passes before noted drop out (13 jets out), and at 98%, the entire print completed without a single dropped jet.
Solid Magenta 100% - 122" Print x 40" - At 100%, we got through 10 passes before significant drop out (26 jets out), at 99%, we got through 31 passes before noted drop out (6 jets out), and at 98%, the entire print completed without any drop out.
While I would love to just dial back the overall color shift on everything from now on, I can't honestly do that because so much of what I print is color sensitive and PMS called matches. I'm just sort of at a loss, as are the folks at Vanguard. We've ruled out negative pressure, we've ruled out the pumps, we've ruled out the primary, secondary, and de-gassing filters, and we've ruled out de-gassing pressure. I'm not sure what else would cause such a massive drop out over 2% increase in ink output.
Any suggestions would really be appreciated.