SP-300V having problems

[wmshuman]

Bare with me on this, it's kind of hard to explain. Basically my printer printed perfectly all day on friday, printing 12 six foot banners without a problem. Today, I try to print more of those banners and the printers acts like it is printing but no ink is coming out, then it skips down like two feet of material and just stalls like it is busy or something.

I printed off 2 inch rows of cyan, magenta, yellow then black, in that order. The cyan was first and it printed flawlessly, so did the magenta, but the yellow had what looks like tiny sliver of lines of cyan, black and magenta in the print.

When it got to the black the first inch of black looks great but then it just stopped and pulled about two feet of material through, then stalled again. I just cancel the prints.

This happened a couple weeks ago but after restarting my mac, it was fine again. This time is not the case though. I'm not sure what's going on here but I have a deadline of tomorrow to have these banners done for DuPont. Can someone help me out that has experienced this before?

 

[CS-SignSupply]

First off... post a picture of your Nozzle Test Print.

Second, are you using VersaWorks with Parallels?

Third, if using VersaWorks, go to Printer Settings and run the Print Test file...

What inks are installed?

When was the last time the captops and dampers were replaced?

 

[wmshuman]

Picture on its way in a couple minutes.

I use Flexisign 8 with Parallels.

The ink that is installed is Roland Eco-Sol Maxx inks, same inks I have used since I bought the machine back in 08.

Captops and Dampers were replaced a couple months ago. I just checked them and they still look clean. The heads even look clean too.

Nothing looks out of the ordinary inside the machine.

I just printed the test print on banner material but overall looks good. The black is dropping out but yellow and magenta are perfect. A couple blocks are missing in the cyan and a few more in the black. Nothing terrible looking tho. I'll attach the pic after I get it off my phone.

 

[wmshuman]

Here are some pics:

 

[wmshuman]

More Pics:

This pics shows the missing black section. If you look close you can see where it printed the very last line of black.

 

[wmshuman]

More pics:

This pic shows the 2 inch lines I was printing and the various lines in the yellow box.

 

[CS-SignSupply]

Power off the printer and unplug the main power. VERY IMPORTANT!

Then check to make sure the Ribbon cables going to the printheads are securely fastened into the head and the head board... normally the connection to the head board is fine.

If a cable is loose, you can get some odd electrical issues.

Button the machine back up, plug in and power on. Try again.

 

[CS-SignSupply]

Seeing as your test print/nozzle test is pretty good, you might be having a communications issue.

 

[wmshuman]

Everything is attached securely. Any other thoughts?

 

[wmshuman]

Yeah it's weird cause it just started happening today. It was printing just fine on Friday and Saturday and nothing has changed since then.

 

[CS-SignSupply]

Call me. 1-877-602-4237. I will try to help over the phone.

 

[wmshuman]

Well, the good news is that after unplugging the cord from the printer and plugging it back in has seemed to help. Back to printing. If I can make it through a whole banner without stopping, I will be impressed. Just finished a miniature version of the banner and made it through. Hope the original looks as good. Thanks.

 

[wmshuman]

Now that I think about it, the power did go off this weekend but the printer was not printing, only in sleep mode. Maybe that had something to do with it? I need to buy a battery backup for this printer just like I have for my computer. Downside is a $200 battery backup will get me three minutes of printing time if the power goes out...lol

 

[CS-SignSupply]

You need to invest in a very good surge supressor. Battery backup really wont give you any advantage for the printer itself.

 

[CS-SignSupply]

If you plan to print while power is off, you need a battery backup for Mac, Network Devices and Printer.. and you still only get 3 minutes or so...

 

[wmshuman]

I have got a good surge protector on the printer but not sure it helps much, being that I am dealing with an electrical issue. I don't plan on printing while the power is off, only while there is a power spike or brownout, which seems to happen a lot in this area. The power will go out for a second or two then come back on. It's weird cause my APC backup will kick on but other areas of the building are not affected including the room where the printer is.

 

[wmshuman]

The benefit of having the battery backup on the printer is so when these couple second power outages occur, I won't have to reset the printer or the job as long as the power comes back within a couple minutes which 95% of the time, they do.

 

[CS-SignSupply]

Have you checked the circuit to make sure it is not overloaded or is grounded properly? Could be a bad breaker or ground within the circuit. Damn mountaineers messin with the power lines again

 

[wmshuman]

Well, I'm back to having the same problem again. Everything had been printing fine since your last suggestion, then last friday the problem started again. I'm not sure what the issue is. I have restarted Parallels, my Mac, the printer, pretty much everything I can think of and still have the issue. I'm just not sure what to do now. Restarting the printer didn't help this time around. I'm starting to think it is a communications issue but not entirely sure. Maybe I should try reinstalling Parallels Tools? Do you think that would help?

 

[wmshuman]

After reinstalling Parallels Tools, and restarting the whole computer and putting the USB plug from the printer directly in the Mac versus using a USB hub, I have managed to fix my problem. My guess is that it was a communications issue but not exactly sure which one considering it was working fine for the past couple months with the previous setup. My guess was the Parallels Tools was the problem. Seems like I'm constantly reinstalling it. Not constantly, but at least a few times a year. Just thought I would post a suggestion if anyone else has had a similar problem with their machine and use a Mac with Parallels. I hate to say it, but with the next printer, I will probably use a dedicated Windows machine for printing. Still love my Mac for designing and piece of mind though.