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6 Months with an imported printer
I have now had my imported printer for 6 month so thought I would share my experiences.
I have previously imported a sublimation set up and a laser cutter/engraver directly from China so when I started thinking about anew,bigger, faster printer I naturally started looking to China.
There are a myriad of printer manufacturers there……..they buy in parts and assemble so a huge amount of parts are common to many printers.
The Chinese mostly use Maintop Rip but some can also use Photprint (Flexisign) RIP and as I have used Flexi with my Mimaki JV3 for years it made sense to look at one that runs Photoprint.
All printer functions and printing are controlled from the supplied Epson print software.After many emails and research I narrowed it down and specced ‘my’ printer….1.6m print width, single Epson DX7 head, pre/post and platten heater, vacuum suction on the platten, take up reel, front fan and Photoprint to supplement the standard Maintop.I added 6 litres each of CMYK ink plus 6 litres of cleaning fluid and loads of spares……..dampers, cap stations etc.
So In November 2012 my bank sent the money by telegraphic transfer…….and spelt the recipients name wrong so the Chinese bank would not release the money……..a correction was sent and after a few days the money was released.
The crate was loaded onto a ship bound for Felixstowe……was interesting watching the ships progress on the net as it left the South China Sea, through the Suez Canal and up through The Mediterranean Sea.
After arriving my agent handled the customs and sent it for delivery to my on a 7.5 tonner with a tail lift.The crate was huge……and heavy. I opened it up and everything was fine……..it look well put together. It took 4 of us to lift it upstairs into position.
Fitting the head was easy…..I bought a new laptop to run it……I had to downgrade from Window8 to Windows XP as the Epson control software runs on XP…….this was a nightmare…..Microsoft certainly do not want you to do this.
The included documentation was basic and I exchanged a few emails that better paperwork could have avoided ( or setup by a printer engineer!) simple things like setting the cleaning pump voltage, head voltage etc.
So it fired up and I got ink through and a good test print 😀
printing from Maintop was fine but I could not get it to print from Photoprint…….turns out you do not print direct to the printer but ‘print to file’ then import that file into the Epson software and print from there.
So what have the problems been? well many issues were because I am not a printer engineer and needed email help from China which has always been answered quickly although you can tell they would rather you figured it out for yourself.
Main issues have been Photprint profiles or the lack of them…….I have only found 1 set from a rival who make the same printer ……..after messing with the dither options I have it really pretty good but may get custom profiles written as I know it can be better.
The post heater temp controller was wired up wrongly meaning the temp could not be controlled but I managed to figure that out by looking at the platten controller which worked fine.
It took longer to get running well because I was busy with work and it was easier and faster to use my Mimaki than mess with the new printer.It has went through 2 cap stations…losing suction… so today I fitted a Digiprint one to see it that is better…..to be fair the manufacturer suggest 3-6 months as a life expectancy and it is a £10 part that takes minutes to change
So all in it is printing great and has already paid for itself several times over.
Importing is certainly not for everyone……..you need to be prepared to find solutions to problems and there will be problems but to be fair if I had used an engineer to install it I would have had far less issues.
Here is is printing….you can see it prints in a wave pattern to eliminate banding and I have found 2 pass printing is perfectly acceptable and the manufacturer quotes 34m squ per hour on this setting which is more than fast enough for me.
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8 Replies
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Hi John
Thanks for the detailed post, really interesting to see how the Chinese machines are coming on so quickly.Just a couple of questions…
What make and model of machine was yours?
If you don’t mind me asking what did it cost you in total with shipping and import duty etc. (if you don’t want to answer I understand!)
On the videos it looks like its only printing uni-directional, does it do bi-directional too?
What speed and quality can you get out of it?
Is there anything that you wish the printer had or things that could be improved?
I’m interested to hear some real world views, its so difficult to get honest feedback out of people, everyone seems to think the printer they have is the best thing since sliced bread, I’m a bit more realistic 🙂
Cheers
Alex
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Hi,
My printer is TJ1604 made by Tec Industry……many others assemble similar.
Yes in the videos it is printing uni directional but of course can print bi directional.
Quality is easily a match for my Mimaki JV3.
Absolute speed is not really an issue for me hence I went for the simpler single head machine and not a twin head. The manufacturer quote 34 squ metre per hour on 2 pass, 17 squ metre on 4 pass.
The machine does not automatically clean and wipe even when printing……you can pause during a print and run a clean/wipe then continue.
At first I was getting ink dropping on prints but this seems to have gone after I reduced the amount of ink in the dampers………initially they were full and possibly causing too much pressure ..anyway reducing the level sorted it…..like I said many issues were down to my lack of experience.The lack of sleep clean ie. the machine does not ‘wake up’ to run a clean wipe cycle has caused no issues with blocked nozzles which I though may be a problem……and of course it is not dumping ink into the waste bottle .
I have twice changed the cap station in 6 months………my JV3 has had 1 in 5 years so this time I fitted a Digiprint Supplies cap station to see if that lasts longer……..just an annoyance if I have to swap this every 3 months…….or it could be that I do not have the capping adjusted correctly causing it to wear quickly.
I am used to the Mimaki and it certainly is a very different machine to that.
My biggest issue is Photoprint profiles as I would like colour output to be a match for the Mimaki. I have borrowed a spectrometer but have not yet tried to use it. I have spoken to a printer engineer who is happy to profile it for me…..he has trained in a couple of Chinese factories and sees no problems with profiling and optimising it……….again this problem is possibly my lack of knowledge in setting Photoprint up for it……at first I just used the same settings as the Mimaki runs but making changes to dither settings made a big difference.
john
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Sounds like you’re nearly there with the machine!
I’m not sure I’d be brave enough to import a machine myself but I guess that’s all down to personal preference.
Thanks for the honest views
Cheers
Alex
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interesting comments John… no sleep clean worries me but interested to hear u had no issues. Must be a perfect seal right now.
Its doing the job u got it for thats the main thing but speed… yeah thats typical roland VS series speed if I am not mistaken.
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John
good to hear all is going well with the printer, you could rig the pump from an alternative power source via a 24 hr timer triggered by a relay so that when you switch the machine off the relay would trigger the timer. It would only run when the machine was switched off though and would not be wired in to the printers circuitry so no need to worry about getting something wrongKev
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Interesting idea Kevin………….like Dave I was initially concerned but so far it has not caused a problem……..but you can see why I want the best/longest lasting cap station I can get.
The pump mechanism is run by a simple 18v ( voltage is set in the control software) electric motor driving 3 cylinders running across a silicone hose……simple but effective which pretty much sums up the engineering on the whole machine .
Interestingly when the printer is on it periodically blasts a little ink for a fraction of a second ( no pump ) but when on and the Epson control software is on the head does not park on the cap station………..I perhaps need to investigate the control software further in case there is a setting I have missed……..another email to China on Monday morning to clarify I think 😀
john
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we used to have a small 1K file which just had a block of ink in it. As the printer was using a print queue, we scheduled the print driver to print this file at certain times during the night, so it kept it moving. Bit of a hack really
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Just a quick update on the lack of a sleep clean on the printer.
The printers were both left unused for 8 days, a window was left slightly open to try and keep the room cool.
Predictably the import printers first nozzle check had nozzles missing………a quick head soak then a couple of cleans and it is back to 100%.
The Mimaki despite having been left plugged in with sleep clean operating also had missing nozzles on the test print (magenta)………one strong clean brought them back.
So a reasonably stiff test has been passed without a major problem.
The Digiprint Supplies replacement cap station is still working fine…….will be interesting to see if it lasts better than the manufacturers items…….they look feel identical despite a £20.00 price difference.
John
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