SC-545 ex not pulling any ink

[dj_paradyme]

Ok. Here's what I have accomplished so far:
1. replaced pumps (did the bit change and everything)
2. replaced all of the dampers.
3. did a pump up ink, then filled ink.

when filling the ink, nothing was being pulled from the ink cartridges. the tubes are filled with air, no ink (except a little left over from before).

not sure what the problem could be. any suggestions?

could every head be dead? i sure hope not. I was reading somewhere about a fuse on the board somewhere, but as far as i can tell, I only see one possible fuse (it's white, about 1/2" long, round, near the very back of the board), and it tested good.

Here is a picture of the fuse, or at least i think.

please help! the estimate we received to fix it (worst case scenario) is $10,000+!!!!!

Thanks!

Nick

 

[BobbyFosson]

The head fuses are not what you have pictured. Have you changed the captops?

What ink is in the machine, how long has it sit unused?

 

[signcrafters]

I AM NOT A ROLAND TECH! FOLLOW AT OWN RISK!

I just had a similar problem.
Got a syringe from drug store, parked the heads, pulled the lines from the pump, sucked out ALL of the air. It took probably 3-4 full pulls to get all of the air out. Kept pulling until the syringe was half full of ink (just to be sure). Put the lines back on the pump. Ran a test print. ALL heads were dead. had to really soak them with cleaner to get the ink moving. Now, it runs like a charm.

Best of luck,
Greg

 

[dj_paradyme]

Where would the head fuses be? We switched to the teneleven ink around 6 months ago. we were out of town for a week at the end of october, when we tried using the machine that following week. only the cyan was working. we cleaned everything over and over, then talked to a tech, replaced the pumps, then dampers. this is where we are now.

should we change the captops? we tried cleaning them by soaking them in solution when we had the pumps out.

i will look for a syrgine somewhere and see if that will help.

thanks.

 

[dj_paradyme]

oh, and we had no problems with the teneleven ink up until this point. using it almost every day for a few months.

 

[BobbyFosson]

I would highly recommend new captops as well. Most, not all, 3rd party inks can not be left unattended for that long without crystallizing or clogging at all.

Be cautious when pulling with a syringe as you can damage the dampers.

Suck all of the ink out and run cleaning fluid through the entire system.

It is possible your heads may not be recoverable.

 

[dj_paradyme]

tried pulling with a syringe, but to no avail. will taking the heads out and soaking them in cleaning solution help? maybe? hopefully? also, if we have to get new heads, if we replace them, is there anything else that needs to be done, like some settings or something in the service menu?

thanks for all of the help.

 

[Jack Knight1979]

I don't think your heads are clogged.

I agree with captops.

The fuses are not pull fuses. they have to be soldered on and they are VERY small. A mistake will run you 1800 for a new board.

If a fuse blew the heads would fail in pairs.

1,2 would fail together
3,4
5,6

Is this what happened?

PM me if you need.

 

[dj_paradyme]

i understand the fuses are soldered in, but i just don't know where they are. all of the lights, that i can see, are lit up green on the boards, so i'm not sure what the problem is.

we took out all of the captops, cleaned them thoroughly so ink could flow through freely. putting solution in the top of them, then sucking it through the hoses works, but tastes bad!

we also took out the heads, and soaked the bottoms of them in solution as well. even though the printer is back together, still nothing.

is there a need to prime the heads, or something? i'm not sure as to what I am supposed to do, since i am not a tech (but am a CS/CE major, so I should be able to figure it out) after replacing the dampers, since the lines are completely full of air.

thanks again to all.

 

[GTSTech_1]

The Fuses are labeled F1, F2, F3 and F4 (No fuse on the F4 space). Look on the oposite corner of the board from where the ribbon cables are connected. I think there is a silver plate and the fuses are located next to it. The silver plate is on the SC-545ex and SJ-1045ex board, not sure about your SC-540 board.

Test the fuses, if they are bad, then it answers the question about why ink not moving, but it doesn't answer why the fuses went bad.

PS- the White Glass fuse you posted a pic of is the fuse for your (Main) Power Board.

 

[Pacific Coast Sign]

#1 Replace all the cap tops.
#2 Use a syringe to pull ink from the cap top line (with the heads capped up)
#3 If no ink comes, you have an air leak (and you will see air bubbles in the syringe)
#4 If no ink use syringe on the Dampers- see if you're getting ink this far.
#5 If you have ink, use an OHM meter to check the fuses - WITH POWER OFF!
#6 If fuses are good... If no ink yet....call your local Roland Tech.

 

[Pacific Coast Sign]

BTW- You're showing the Power board...the fuses are on the mainboard...about the size of a grain of rice and $3-$5 each

 

[stevesign]

Are you using Refillable ink cartridges ? Maybe a stupid question, but have you already tried swapping the cartridge ? Its not always the machine at fault when ink can't be pulled.

Sometimes the rubber bung in the refillable cart is to blame, (at least - it has for me on that printer model).

If your using non-refillable ink then its obviously not the problem.

 

[rockiat]

I'm not a techie or anything but had some experience with one of the worse third party inks from china on my VP-540 and i did experience this before and have switched back to Eco-Sol Max ever since.

To remedy the situation, we'd usually park the heads on the capping stations (think the mechanics should be similar to the XC) and we'd suck the inks out from the drain tubes that juts out into the drain bottles. Make sure your syringe is secured tightly to the drain tubes and slowly pull it out. You should feel a bit of resistance. Keep on pulling until you start seeing ink coming into your syringe. Repeat same step for every drain tube. Then try and do a normal clean. This usually works for us.

If you do not feel any resistance when pulling the syringe, then it means you've either got a leak in the drain tubes or the capping station.

Good luck!

Good luck!