Roland VP 540 head cleaning way to often!

[customeyez]

I have a 4 year old vp-540 and it keeps stopping to clean in the middle of a print. It stops about every 5 minutes and runs a cleaning. I've read about others having the same problem but haven't found the solution. I am running Eco-Sol Max Roland Ink. The printer will stop printing, head shoots to capping station, screen reads CLEANING and it does the clicks and ticks and then resumes printing.

It started doing it a few Saturdays ago. The day before I had to change the Black and Magenta inks. I was printing mostly unattended that day so not sure if it started right away or not. After reading some people say that third party inks will cause the VP to do this I changed out the two cartridges with new ones again. The problem went away and printed fine. I decided to try to see which one was bad or if it was a fluke so I put the two back in and it started doing the cleaning thing again. I swapped the black back around with the one that was working fine and it kept cleaning so I swapped the magenta out for the one that was working fine and it has been doing the cleaning ever since.

The periodic cleaning setting is turned to off, firmware is up to date, and I am really getting frustrated. Any help would be great.

 

[premiercolour]

I believe it is the chip issue.

We put a bulk system(four empty cartridge without chip to refill with bulk bottle) without chip on a VP540 before. It cleans every couple minute. After cartridge is chipped, problem was solved.

1. Contact Roland for new chips.
2. We have compatible chip for Eco Max $8/pc

 

[Fatboy]

Yes it is the chip.

 

[customeyez]

I went into the service menu last night and found that the printer is not recognizing any of the chips.

 

[Robert M]

Chip

Welcome to Roland's little trick to punish you for not running their inks in your printer. I wonder if that is legal?

 

[premiercolour]

Take out any previous used chip from a Eco Max Cartridge. You can put them onto the new cartridge. It is color specific.

 

[customeyez]

The problem is I am using Roland Cartridges but the machine is not recognizing them. I went into the service menu after downloading a service manual and tried signaling the cartridges. There is something wrong inside machine because it's not reading the chips.

 

[premiercolour]

May it is the contact part that you push the cartridge to the printer. Check on that. That should be the only thing left to take a look. Or call the Roland dealer near you. They should able to trouble shoot for you.

 

[Andrew O]

I've asked Tech Support to give you a call and diagnose the issue.

 

[Kentucky Wraps]

Weird thing is...why would ink cartridge status have anything to do with cleaning print heads?
I've never had that problem and I've used both EcoSol Max and Solaris inks.

 

[customeyez]

From what I gather Roland has set up the VP (and possible subsequent) printers to go into sabotage mode when you use a third party ink. Now their stupid system is malfunctioning in my printer and constantly cleans because it doesn't recognize the cartridges. I kinda wish I would have stuck with my trusty SP series printer. I sit here and watch my waste ink bottle fill while printing. Two calls in to Roland Tech support and I now have current firmware and a rebooted system and that's about it. The HP L26500 is looking better all the time.

 

[graphicsphere]

Hi I read your post about your VP-540 chips not being detected in service mode and goes into cleaning cycles every few minutes when printing. Did you ever find an answer? I have the same problem with my VP-540. I have tried taking the OEM Sol Max Chips off and put on my bulk cartridges and still it won't detect the IC chips or stop cleaning way to many times during printing.

 

[graphicsphere]

Here’s the answer:

I have a VP-540 that has 2 broken IC Cartridge Sensors inside Slot 3 and Slot 4 of the Ink Cartridge Slots. I attached a picture of the sensors that I need to replace. There is no manual on how to change them out and just need some pointers on what to take off first so I can get the sensors replaced.

 

[Mikethestripe]

Here’s the answer:

I have a VP-540 that has 2 broken IC Cartridge Sensors inside Slot 3 and Slot 4 of the Ink Cartridge Slots. I attached a picture of the sensors that I need to replace. There is no manual on how to change them out and just need some pointers on what to take off first so I can get the sensors replaced.

Hello graphicsphere,

Did you happen to have the part # for the cartridge sensors? I am having the same issues as yours