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HELP WITH NEW HP LATEX L26500 – PRINT QUALITY GRAINY
Hello All,
I have had my new latex machine installed and i have been converted from solvent to latex so really looking forward to increased production times and improved print quality.
In saying this i am using metmark md3 digital media and am finding the print quality to be abit grainy . When the tech installed it we started off wiith metamark profile but found it not handling the temperatures to well so he switched it over to a standard hp profile for self adhesive.This stop the tunneling and seem to print ok.But the prints are grainy .
Can anyone help with assisting with pointing me in the right direction?
Am i using the wrong profile , shouldnt the metamark profile work ?
Is the hp profile really right for the metamark md3 media ?I guess this is a new learning curve for me since i have just come from mimaki jv3 solvent machine .
Anyone help would be great .
Cheers,
PJ -
5 Replies
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I dont use the metamark materials I’m normally Hexis or Paper Graphics and I’ve only had the L26500 for 10 months but I’ll certainly try and help you if you want to give me a call or pm phone number Ill try and work through some things with you.
Kev
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In my experience monomeric films don’t work so well on latex printers , possibly because they tend not to have a PE lined backing sheet to help with the heat , also polymeric and cast films are more stable and have a better print surface so would produce much better results.
MD5 , 3551 , IJ 40 , MPI2000 should all work well.
Cheers
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Try Avery MPI 3000 PP in your machine. We’ve run about 30,000 squares metres through our HP L25500’s.
Avery has changed their formulation lately the older stock used to run a lot better. Some rolls can have a bit of a curl at the very start of the run.
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You could try turning the OMAS sensor off. It’s not a problem I’ve personally had but I’ve heard it can cause strange problems on certain media, and it’s an easy thing to try.
It will need to be turned off in the RIP. In Onyx you right click the job in the print queue, Edit/Printer Settings/Advanced Options and uncheck the box that says ‘Automatic Tracking (OMAS)’.
John
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Hi
Is the grainy result worse on areas of heavier ink lay-down or is it even across the print?
If you are seeing it everywhere then make sure you have done a print head calibration.
If you are seeing it more in areas of heavy ink then this is ‘coalescence’ – the print has not stayed under the heater long enough to cure properly. It is usually dry to touch but not cured -i.e the latex has not been allowed to fully melt in an even way and on very close inspection it looks a little like oily clumps of ink surrounded by areas of lighter ink so from a distance it looks grainy.
The solution is to ensure more curing. This can be done by slowing the printer or you can keep the same speed and increase the temps assuming your media can handle more heat.
There are no issues with Monomeric SAVs as a rule – most work fine but some have specific requirements – looking at the Onyx MD3 profile that is on the HP Media Locator website I see it is only built for 16 passes which is much slower than most SAVs so this tells me this particular vinyl is a challenge to run at the speed you are probably using from the HP profile and thus your problem is likely to be coalescence.
As a quick check you could try running the HP profile at 16 passes to see if it improves or Google the HP Media Locator website and download the MD3 profile and you will be good to go – assuming you made the right choice of RIP and went with Onyx?…no other rips are supported with profiles for this and most other media on the HP Media Locator.
Good luck!
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