VG-640 Service Call 0380 advice?

[emhmotorsports]

Hi everyone, I'm looking for some advice. My VG-640 has been working well for the past several months and just this week started throwing a 0380 [0040] code. Initially a couple of power cycles would get it to come back, but that stopped working. I popped the head cover off and sure enough the damper flag for the Lk ink isn't moving. I've tried several damper fills. The damper flag pulls in and stays there (which, to me, indicates the system is air tight and no issue with the caps), but when the pumps start running this flag never moves. I removed the rear cover to verify that the pump is indeed spinning. I popped open the peristaltic pump for this channel to take a look; the tubing looks OK, but is a little flattened.

I bought the machine used, so I can't be sure on the age of components, but has about 1900 hrs on it. My question for the group is: does this seem about right for the lifespan of the pump? I'd just hate to throw $300 at a new pump, wait for it to arrive, and discover it may not have been the issue. So looking for any collective guidance...

 

[Joe House]

Did you make sure that there's ink in that cartridge?

 

[emhmotorsports]

Alright! So nearly exactly a month later (due to waiting for parts)...it appears the issue was the pump. He's how I got there:

After observing the system a bit more, I noticed that by gently placing a finger on top of the filter (Roland seems to refer to this as a valve-assy, but sure seems to function like a filter) that it wasn't pulsing like the other channels when the pump was running. This seemed a pretty clear indication to me that the pump wasn't pumping, so I ordered one right away. Installed the new pump today, voila! ink is again flowing!

The worst part of this was the waiting. The machine became a 500 lb paperweight for nearly 30 days due to the one malfunctioning channel meaning that it couldn't clean itself or circulate ink, so I was in constant worry of having to install another few thousand bucks in heads. Every other day or so, I'd manually wipe down the heads with some solvent to keep them moist, then go out back and sacrifice a couple of chickens to the printer gods. The good news is that it seems to have worked, as I don't have any dot dropouts. Lucky or good...I guess I'll never know which.

 

[emhmotorsports]

I've had a chance to dive deeper into the malfunctioning pump and thought I'd share with the group. After fully cracking open the pump, I discovered what I missed in my quick initial peek. There are 2 plastic tabs that are used to control the position of the rollers. It seems one was completely broken off and the 2nd was just flapping in the breeze. These tabs are what force the rollers to their outer most position to engage the tubing when the pump is rotating in one direction. So, in short, the rollers were never making it out to the tubing and so no ink could be pumped.

Assuming these pumps were never replaced, that yields a lifetime of about 1980 hrs. I'm sure individual mileage may vary, but if your machine is getting up there in hours, you may want to be proactive and replace the pumps (or at least have a spare on hand). Peristaltic pumps are simple by design, so not many components to fail, but these additional parts that Roland added to their design happened to the be point of failure.

On a side note, I figured for near $200 the pumps would come with a new motor - but no, just plastic. To pour a little salt on the wound, these tabs that broke are actually removable/replaceable, but Roland only sells the pump as a complete unit. What a great racket Roland has going on here...