Should I get this Roland VS540i

[soloinstaller]

Going to see a Roland VS540i printer listed for $750, guy says it hasn't been plugged in for 2 years and won't print at the moment but says it was printing properly before he unplugged it (he switched to working in a completely different industry)

Worth the gamble?

 

[ikarasu]

Going to see a Roland VS540i printer listed for $750, guy says it hasn't been plugged in for 2 years and won't print at the moment but says it was printing properly before he unplugged it (he switched to working in a completely different industry)

Worth the gamble?

At minimum you need new heads... You could also need new lines.

There's a dozen printers like that in the papers over here... Odds are they want it gone, I bet if you offered $200 they'd take it.

Just expect to put a lot of work into it

 

[netsol]

if it's your first time repairing one, figure the price of heads, captops, dampers, potentially pumps. (pumps can be rebuilt but you have never done it before, might buy on ebay)
just don't expect that you will buy on monday and have perfect prints by wednesday afternoon
you will spend a couple days of your time AT BEST. offer $200. as was suggested. settle in the middle if the machine is clean

 

[soloinstaller]

I appreciate your replies! I picked up the machine but unfortunately won't be able to get around to working on it for a while. Guy included a set of unopened ink cartridges as well as a Versaworks CD, cleaning cartridges and a whole bag of other stuff.

I'm pretty proud of myself that I've been able to keep busy doing cut vinyl/outsourcing but I really want to start using air egress film and not have to order a million different colors of vinyl... Hopefully I can get this thing going wish me luck!

 

[Roland Certified Tech]

Yes, GOOD LUCK!

 

[ikarasu]

I appreciate your replies! I picked up the machine but unfortunately won't be able to get around to working on it for a while. Guy included a set of unopened ink cartridges as well as a Versaworks CD, cleaning cartridges and a whole bag of other stuff.

I'm pretty proud of myself that I've been able to keep busy doing cut vinyl/outsourcing but I really want to start using air egress film and not have to order a million different colors of vinyl... Hopefully I can get this thing going wish me luck!

Good luck!

If you spend all that time putting in a new head and lines... Make sure the ink isn't too old, or you'll destroy all the progress you've made using it.

 

[truckgraphics]

I guess you have a cutter, but at the very least now you have a second one - assuming that part works.

 

[Applied Graphics WY]

Going to see a Roland VS540i printer listed for $750, guy says it hasn't been plugged in for 2 years and won't print at the moment but says it was printing properly before he unplugged it (he switched to working in a completely different industry)

Worth the gamble?

I have the same model. Overall, I love it. 2 drawbacks you have to upgrade some parts if you want to print white, & the plotter is not super accurate for small detail work. It works
great for medium to larger cuts however.
I've had to complete clean my lines twice but so far but that was due to mistakes on my end.

 

[soloinstaller]

Thanks for the replies! So the head is not putting out a single drop of ink on test prints.

Im following another thread on here closely of someone who had the same issue and same machine, turns out their issue was with a bad connector so I'm going to rule out transistors on the main board and print head ribbons before going any further. Luckily my brother is an Electronics Engineer so he'll be able to help me out with all that stuff.

Ink passes through to waste can on normal cleanings so it looks like theres some flow through the head? In the meantime I've got the cap soaked.

 

[soloinstaller]

Here's a video of a test print, are we allowed to post links here? If not let me know and ill delete it right away.

It's also making this clicking noise coming from the right behind where the control panel is, pump going bad? Happens during startup, cleaning and test prints.

 

[damonCA21]

That head is shot you have pretty much zero chance of getting a good print. The captop also looks very dry.
To be honest unless you have experience of fixing these I would leave it and just buy one that works. By the time you replace the heads and everything else and spend the time it will work out around the same price.
It is VERY unlikely to be a connector or something simple. Roland printers need to be in use all the time to keep them running properly. Being left unplugged for 2 years will make them scrap in most cases

 

[hussondros]

I have the same model. Overall, I love it. 2 drawbacks you have to upgrade some parts if you want to print white, & the plotter is not super accurate for small detail work. It works
great for medium to larger cuts however.
I've had to complete clean my lines twice but so far but that was due to mistakes on my end.

Thanks for sharing your experience! Quick question when you upgraded the parts to print white, which specific parts did you change, and did it make a big difference in quality?

 

[ChicagoGraphics]

Here's a video of a test print, are we allowed to post links here? If not let me know and ill delete it right away.

It's also making this clicking noise coming from the right behind where the control panel is, pump going bad? Happens during startup, cleaning and test prints.

The clicking noise is normal it's pumping ink into the lines

 

[soloinstaller]

That head is shot you have pretty much zero chance of getting a good print. The captop also looks very dry.
To be honest unless you have experience of fixing these I would leave it and just buy one that works. By the time you replace the heads and everything else and spend the time it will work out around the same price.
It is VERY unlikely to be a connector or something simple. Roland printers need to be in use all the time to keep them running properly. Being left unplugged for 2 years will make them scrap in most cases

I hear you on that, I have no doubt the head would be no good after sitting for that long. I saw the printer for sale and figured I would give it a shot. I wanted to to see if I could at least get the head firing anything and then get replacement head, caps etc. off Sign in Global. However I think I'll end up parting it out if I can't find out why the head isn't firing. So far the fuses and transistors are all perfectly fine...

 

[damonCA21]

Dont buy heads from sign in global,they are all either scams or 'refubished; - you can't refurbish the heads. All they do is clean the outside of non working heads. Only buy a proper new head from someone with a good reputation in the US ( and not from Digiprint! )
The caps are also cheap chinese copies and Rolands are pretty sensitive to these,so buy OEM ones as well as dampers.
If the fuses and transistors are fine then it is most likely the head is firing, but completely blocked so no ink will come out.
If you can do all the work yourself you are looking at around $3000 - $3500 in parts and new inks so it depends if it is worth it to you. I hope you didn't pay more than $500 for the printer as that is all it is worth at the moment

 

[truckgraphics]

Replace the cap top and soak the head are your first steps to recovery, so I am told.

I also have a non-ink firing VS-540. (I replaced the printer with a newer model.) Not ready to give up, but won't buy a head if that's bad. Makes no sense as the printer isn't worth more than $4,000 on its best day and a head runs $2,500 plus.

But get the printer working without spending on a new head and you've (we've) turned a pile of parts into something with value.

Anyway, I'm going to try a couple ideas in the next week or so and will report back.

I'll be interested to see if you can get yours working with the old print head. Keep us informed. I'm interested in your experience.

Keep your head up!

 

[soloinstaller]

Dont buy heads from sign in global,they are all either scams or 'refubished; - you can't refurbish the heads. All they do is clean the outside of non working heads. Only buy a proper new head from someone with a good reputation in the US ( and not from Digiprint! )
The caps are also cheap chinese copies and Rolands are pretty sensitive to these,so buy OEM ones as well as dampers.
If the fuses and transistors are fine then it is most likely the head is firing, but completely blocked so no ink will come out.
If you can do all the work yourself you are looking at around $3000 - $3500 in parts and new inks so it depends if it is worth it to you. I hope you didn't pay more than $500 for the printer as that is all it is worth at the moment

Hmm ok, I definitely have to be careful with my next step. I'm trying to narrow down everything to make sure that it truly is the print head that is the major issue. I'm thinking the board on the head itself is fried, reason being is that I'm getting ink coming through to the waste bottle on a cleaning cycle. I see some ink splatter on the inside of the plastic carriage cover, maybe the previous owner disconnected incorrectly and spilled ink on the PH board.

This machine throws out no error codes, green LED on the carriage board is on does that mean its board working fine? Haven't checked ribbons yet but will inspect closely and test for continuity. But yeah no fuses blown out, tested outside of the board and tested transistors multiple times all reading 41ish

Replace the cap top and soak the head are your first steps to recovery, so I am told.

I also have a non-ink firing VS-540. (I replaced the printer with a newer model.) Not ready to give up, but won't buy a head if that's bad. Makes no sense as the printer isn't worth more than $4,000 on its best day and a head runs $2,500 plus.

But get the printer working without spending on a new head and you've (we've) turned a pile of parts into something with value.

Anyway, I'm going to try a couple ideas in the next week or so and will report back.

I'll be interested to see if you can get yours working with the old print head. Keep us informed. I'm interested in your experience.

Keep your head up!

I will keep updating, good luck to you too!

 

[damonCA21]

It could still be a bad mainboard but is most likely the head. Unlikely to be the cables as they don't all tend to fail.

Head is most likely culprit but sadly you either get a cheap head or a working head, not both

 

[soloinstaller]

So I've decided I'm going to just get rid of this printer. I realize how much stress this is giving me and taking away my focus from my work. Its getting borderline obsessive and I find myself doing research and thinking about this all day, and the thought of putting thousands of dollars into this and possibly not working out is giving me massive anxiety.

Even if I do get this printer running, I will be opening a can of worms to the world of printer maintenance, troubleshooting and operation which I now know I want to have nothing to do with lol. I'm going to continue outsourcing prints and leave it up to the pros. I'm looking at my shortcomings that I thought a printer would fix and see that there are more conventional ways to solve these issues. Feels good actually.

Regardless, thanks everybody for the discussion!