Need Help Speckled printing?

[yourdesignprinting]

Anyone know why I am getting speckled prints? No crisps line. Roland Versacamm SP300i. What would cause this? My crop marks that print in black are perfect with no specs though? New cap tops, new wipers, new print heads. Clean decoder strip.

 

[weyandsign]

Is it only black having the problem? Post a nozzle test pattern. What material are you printing on?

 

[yourdesignprinting]

It mostly is the red and yellow. Test print looks good. I print on the Arylon 4500G. Been printing on Arylon over 10 years now. Thanks for the reply. I just went to Roland and submitted a ticket. See if they reply. My warranty expired 10yrs ago. lol. Someone had to have this problem before.

 

[rjssigns]

It's losing position. Start by cleaning the encoder strip.

 

[yourdesignprinting]

It's losing position. Start by cleaning the encoder strip.

Thank you. I will try that. I always clean the rail it rides on, but don't think I ever cleaned the strip.

 

[yourdesignprinting]

Thank you. I will try that. I always clean the rail it rides on, but don't think I ever cleaned the strip.

I just cleaned it and it is still misting red. It was dirty but didn't cure my problem.

 

[rjssigns]

It's been a while since I owned a Roland so my memory of fixes may not be the best.
Encoder strip could still be an issue. There may be wear spots on it. Easy fix by flipping it over. I did that with mine then ended up replacing it.
Encoder reader board may be on its way out. Cheap and simple fix.

I would look at the above first then go from there.

Ribbon cables may be going out. They are considered a consumable. Cheap enough to replace just a little tedious.

VanderJ should be along in a bit to shed some light on your issue. He's a great tech and I'm just a guy that had to do stuff to keep printing.

 

[yourdesignprinting]

It's been a while since I owned a Roland so my memory of fixes may not be the best.
Encoder strip could still be an issue. There may be wear spots on it. Easy fix by flipping it over. I did that with mine then ended up replacing it.
Encoder reader board may be on its way out. Cheap and simple fix.

I would look at the above first then go from there.

Ribbon cables may be going out. They are considered a consumable. Cheap enough to replace just a little tedious.

VanderJ should be along in a bit to shed some light on your issue. He's a great tech and I'm just a guy that had to do stuff to keep printing.

Thank you for even trying to help me. I appreciate it. At a loss when problems and no one can help me. Not even youtube this time. lol. That is why I am trying this site. People that print and think like me:} It appears that the red/yellow are the misting heads. Some reason just that one head.

 

[Solventinkjet]

The nozzle check picture is pretty blurry but it doesn't look like you have a ton of deflections which is what I would have thought at first. I'd run the head alignments to make sure everything is tight but unfortunately it seems like one or more bad heads. You might also look at the room environment. Low humidity and high heat will cause issues sometimes.

 

[Joe House]

+1 for your environment. Temp between 70 and 89 F and Relative Humidity between 40 and 60%. (BTW Vander, from what I've seen static almost always affects cyan pigments first. If it's really bad other colors can be pulled off course, but cyan seems to be the most vulnerable.)
Also check your inks. Are they outdated? Most solvent inks have a life of 2 years from the date of manufacture. Also, in my experience some cheaper inks are just cheaper. If you're using something other than Roland, you might try getting some Roland ink in there to see if this clears up.

 

[yourdesignprinting]

I have been printing in the same room over 10 years. I only use Roland parts. The inks are less than 6 months old. Just did some more test prints. You don't see the speckles in test prints? Thanks for trying to help me.

 

[bigkahuna_305]

How old are the heads? Could be tbe head is starting to die in ya. But I would try the encoder strip flip first. My vs540 did this and it was static mostly and a dirty strip. I got a static rope that the material would go under before it went into the print area and that helped it go away.

 

[rjssigns]

Something I just remembered. When my KC was on its way out if I needed to make a clean print I would run Unidirectional. If it clears up I would tend to agree with VanderJ, that the head is dying.

 

[BigNate]

.... may be way off base here, but if all the tests print clean, and other jobs print clean (as do the crop marks....) Could it be the artwork? the speckles almost look like a dither pattern - almost like it is trying to put in the 1-5% fill for a blank area of a pic (for those who don't know yet, you never print 0% dot for pictures as the transition to 0% looks weird - pics typically use a dynamic range of 5%-95% fill) If you have a rip or print driver that is treating the image like a pic and not line-art you will get speckles around objects.

 

[yourdesignprinting]

One head is years old and the blk one is new. I did these prints in different colors. So weird. Might be the head is going bad. Even though the test pattern looks ok. Misty might be a sign of a bad head;} Was hoping for a bad damper or cheaper part.

 

[yourdesignprinting]

.... may be way off base here, but if all the tests print clean, and other jobs print clean (as do the crop marks....) Could it be the artwork? the speckles almost look like a dither pattern - almost like it is trying to put in the 1-5% fill for a blank area of a pic (for those who don't know yet, you never print 0% dot for pictures as the transition to 0% looks weird - pics typically use a dynamic range of 5%-95% fill) If you have a rip or print driver that is treating the image like a pic and not line-art you will get speckles around objects.

I was wondering if it was something with the artwork. That is why I just drew some boxes with colors to see how they print. These are vector art saved post script 3 .eps using the Maximpact in versaworks. Should be perfect. Still red misty splatter. Even my bitmap style design with vector art printed with red dots outside and in the white. Thanks for the suggestions and ideas.

 

[Signature Sign Guys]

It might be a bandaid fix but have you tried printing at a slower speed? I know when I want really crisp clean lines I slow my print head speed right down

 

[yourdesignprinting]

It might be a bandaid fix but have you tried printing at a slower speed? I know when I want really crisp clean lines I slow my print head speed right down

I will try that before I order a new head. Thanks for the suggestion.

 

[yourdesignprinting]

Anyone interested in fix I will post again when I get a new print head.
**Wasting ink trouble shooting tonight. I switched the red and yellow damper ink lines on the head. Yep! The misting turned yellow. So must be that one part of the head it bad. That is why I can print 100% K and no red misting, but when printing roland colors like 60,60,40,100 I get red misting around it. Looks like next step is to get a new print head.