Latex vs Solvent inks. Opinions please.

[Jamie Wood]

We’ve got an Epson 80600, and it can hit 021 orange, and most other Pantones. Best printer we’ve had.

[Kevin Mahoney]

How do they compare with ink on running costs?

[Jamie Wood]

We’ve never had a latex printer, but the Epson ink is around £75 – £80.00 for 700ml, so more economical than our Mimaki,
and the colours are spot on.

[David Wilde]

Our HP latex inks are lower cost than our solvent inks. However with the HP printer, the print heads are a consumable and need changing more regularly, estimate the costs work out about the same with this in mind.

[David Wilde]

In terms of which is better, we prefer to use the latex as our main printer. Although others will have their own opinion on which is best.

[Kevin Mahoney]

We have a job on the anvil at the moment to wrap a humongous catering trailer in a bright orange with a very complex burgundy watermark/pattern over every inch of it. We all know the headache associated with printing vivid oranges or greyscale with solvent cmyk so I’m very interested to hear more views on this. 3 sign companies have produced samples for this job so far & been shot down by the client for orange not being as vivid as the iMac screen at their graphic designers office. I have explained the difficulty that he’s created for each of the companies he’s approached when he dismissed them all as ‘crap’ but the only acceptable option I’ve come up with is to print directly to an orange vinyl & overlaminate.

[Jamie Wood]

quote Kevin Mahoney:

We have a job on the anvil at the moment to wrap a humongous catering trailer in a bright orange with a very complex burgundy watermark/pattern over every inch of it. We all know the headache associated with printing vivid oranges or greyscale with solvent cmyk so I’m very interested to hear more views on this. 3 sign companies have produced samples for this job so far & been shot down by the client for orange not being as vivid as the iMac screen at their graphic designers office. I have explained the difficulty that he’s created for each of the companies he’s approached when he dismissed them all as ‘crap’ but the only acceptable option I’ve come up with is to print directly to an orange vinyl & overlaminate.

Happy to print you a test patch, so that you can see the colour.

[Kevin Mahoney]

That would be fantastic to see that, could be a much cheaper way to do it than my way

[Jamie Wood]

No proble, if you send it to jamie@ashmanandclough.co.uk, I’ll get a sample printed. Will just a gloss polymeric be OK?

[Kevin Mahoney]

Perfect thanks Jamie
Just requested vector from the design agency

[Neil Danley]

We have the S80600 and it has a dedicated orange channel and won a job printing a few bits for EasyJet. You should be able to hit the colour you are after quite easily on it.

Good to see these are becoming more popular.

Neil D.

[P. Harris]

Hi
Having run solvent, then latex…
My brief view as a user… Latex, brill if using hp originals, inks, heads…
But please factor in what the machine uses, all the disposable’s …
But here’s my beef, HP need really need shaming…For Dropping Old, and very well solid built machines,
but of which are still running 100%… for why? what? reason?…
But… All other Printer Main Brands Can Go On And On And On….
No Matter the Age… Granted I Did Love The Fact and it is briil… instant Print, and ready to Use…
But as a Brand to drop and kill machines as such… is nothing more than as shameful.
…So moving back to solvent printer brand, loads of choices, loads of ink, loads of orginal part,
loads of machines.. hope this helps
Cheers Paul
ps- they are solid machines, i mean, solid machines, over engineered, but you got to keep original
consumables.. one brand, no real choice on third party consumables…
pps-but if your doing wraps, and wallpaper, their up there above the solvents

[Wayne Fothergill]

quote Kevin Mahoney:

We have a job on the anvil at the moment to wrap a humongous catering trailer in a bright orange with a very complex burgundy watermark/pattern over every inch of it. We all know the headache associated with printing vivid oranges or greyscale with solvent cmyk so I’m very interested to hear more views on this. 3 sign companies have produced samples for this job so far & been shot down by the client for orange not being as vivid as the iMac screen at their graphic designers office. I have explained the difficulty that he’s created for each of the companies he’s approached when he dismissed them all as ‘crap’ but the only acceptable option I’ve come up with is to print directly to an orange vinyl & overlaminate.

Another endorsement of the orange on the S80600 here. We got one last year and the machine is incredible and I never cease to be amazed whenever I print a job with 021 Orange, even with a matt laminate the colour still really pops.

If they aren’t happy with the sample Jamie prints you then there’s probably no pleasing them.

[Simon Worrall]

quote P. Harris:

Hi
Having run solvent, then latex…
My brief view as a user… Latex, brill if using hp originals, inks, heads…
But please factor in what the machine uses, all the disposable’s …
But here’s my beef, HP need really need shaming…For Dropping Old, and very well solid built machines,
but of which are still running 100%… for why? what? reason?…
But… All other Printer Main Brands Can Go On And On And On….
No Matter the Age… Granted I Did Love The Fact and it is briil… instant Print, and ready to Use…
But as a Brand to drop and kill machines as such… is nothing more than as shameful.
…So moving back to solvent printer brand, loads of choices, loads of ink, loads of orginal part,
loads of machines.. hope this helps
Cheers Paul
ps- they are solid machines, i mean, solid machines, over engineered, but you got to keep original
consumables.. one brand, no real choice on third party consumables…
pps-but if your doing wraps, and wallpaper, their up there above the solvents

When you say they dropped the older machines, what exactly do you mean?
Is there no servicing at all available? or are there no spare parts? or what exactly?
You see Im considering a second hand 255000 purchase, quite cheap.
should I drop the idea as impractical?

[Hugh Potter]

quote Simon Worrall:

When you say they dropped the older machines, what exactly do you mean?
Is there no servicing at all available? or are there no spare parts? or what exactly?
You see Im considering a second hand 255000 purchase, quite cheap.
should I drop the idea as impractical?

I believe you can buy 3rd party inks and even consumables for the 25500, but I’m not sure what is available other than ink.

The 26500 (I have) is going the same way, they’ve been pushing up ink prices for the past few years (from £80 3.5yrs ago to £110 now – ex vat) to persuade people to move onto the newer machines, now they’ve gone full fat and given dates for the cessation of ink production, heads, maintenance carts etc.. I dare say there’ll be stock for quite some time but it’s a real kick in the nuts for those of with finance still on the older machines, and PX worth less than the finance balance.

Now all the suppliers are trying to sell us the 310/360/365/560 (whatever) and saying "it won’t happen again now that the newer tech is sorted", but it probably will- HP just don’t want old equipment out there. There’s informed rumour that a new generation is coming out within a year – hence the "amazing" deals on 365’s etc. Personally I’ll wait and pay more for a new generation that’s likely to have a much longer serviceable life when I’m forced to upgrade.

I just resent the fact that HP have pretty much destroyed the used latex market values with this action. Though I will 99% go latex again.

[Simon Worrall]

I spose that explains why its cheap! Thanks Hugh.
Actually the seller has quoted lack of support by HP as the reason for the sale.
Sounds like something Apple would do. Its bad business practice.

Guess I would just be buying a giant paperweight.
Perhaps Ill leave it. There’d be even less chance of keeping it running here in NZ.

Are the heads still available or have they upgraded these also?
I was told these are consumer changeable items.

[Hugh Potter]

quote Simon Worrall:

I spose that explains why its cheap! Thanks Hugh.
Actually the seller has quoted lack of support by HP as the reason for the sale.
Sounds like something Apple would do. Its bad business practice.

Guess I would just be buying a giant paperweight.
Perhaps Ill leave it. There’d be even less chance of keeping it running here in NZ.

Are the heads still available or have they upgraded these also?
I was told these are consumer changeable items.

Heads are consumables on these printers, my 26500 uses none for 6 months and then 2 or 3 in a space of weeks! typically I’ve replaced them all once annually at my usage, they’re about £80 each + vat. I still figure that better than trashing a £1500 solvent head or two and needing and engineer / downtime etc.

The 26500 will be in a similar position to the 25500 in due course. I don’t know what 25500 users do for heads, maybe someone can answer as I know a few here still use them. Have you looked on ebay / google?

[Myriam Garrido]

I actually wrote to the president of HP a few days ago in respect of them stopping production of inks, heads etc for large format printers yet they base their advertising on them having ‘greener credentials’ and sign makers are to be left with large plastic machines that aren’t able to do anything with !

Will post if he can be bothered to reply

Watch this space !

[Peter Munday]

Have you got his details, and maybe we can all write to him. He might get the idea then.

[Myriam Garrido]

Hi Peter

It was an online form I had to complete. Link below – go for it ! The more that voice their disquiet and anger the more they’re likely to do something about it….maybe hopefully

Enrique Lores President & CEO

https://ssl.www8.hp.com/uk/en/contact-h … th-hp.html

[Deleted User]

Hi.

Was about to drop a similar question. I am personally a Roland user, whether is solvent, UV , all printers are Roland brand and all repairs are carried out by myself when if required from head changes to whatever goes wrong, at least so far.

I love the sound of latex scratch and instant dryness but I am scared if investing into it after warranty is out whether I can repair quickly them myself, what I love in Roland that some spares fit different printers so less keeping for spares and as being able to work on them myself usually can fix it within just few hours even if including a part that I do not stock but is available at the Roland depo then I will drive to get it asap to be back on track with all machines just few hours from problem arising.

I have been doing some small research and e.g on my Truevis heads all heads are still brand new, as an example Magenta when I have checked invoices for past orders went through 11k liters of magenta ink and its still running perfect no deflection on nozzles so plenty more to go. From what I have managed to find Latex is approx 2k liters at least warranted by HP ? tho I managed to find some people claiming they managed to do 4k, but most do say around 2 k liters.

If its 2k then e.g. in my case this becomes a lot more expensive tho they are a bit cheaper per head and user changeable but on Roland ts just a cost of a head no engineer cost involved anyway for myself, so going with latex sounds are its more expensive as head change and would require frequent changes.

Another Roland printer checking invoices all heads were replaced at nearly same time with just around 2 week difference and each one is at around 12k liters or more with all nozzles perfect still going strong everyday.

Spoke to a local guy who has latex and he also said every few rolls tho its hard to get a better idea of a true consumption to me as some prints could use more then others but he said would change head around every 4/5 rolls.

To any latex users out there is that true ? that the heads only last so little ?

[Hugh Potter]

quote Mariusz Zduniuk:

Hi.

Was about to drop a similar question. I am personally a Roland user, whether is solvent, UV , all printers are Roland brand and all repairs are carried out by myself when if required from head changes to whatever goes wrong, at least so far.

I love the sound of latex scratch and instant dryness but I am scared if investing into it after warranty is out whether I can repair quickly them myself, what I love in Roland that some spares fit different printers so less keeping for spares and as being able to work on them myself usually can fix it within just few hours even if including a part that I do not stock but is available at the Roland depo then I will drive to get it asap to be back on track with all machines just few hours from problem arising.

I have been doing some small research and e.g on my Truevis heads all heads are still brand new, as an example Magenta when I have checked invoices for past orders went through 11k liters of magenta ink and its still running perfect no deflection on nozzles so plenty more to go. From what I have managed to find Latex is approx 2k liters at least warranted by HP ? tho I managed to find some people claiming they managed to do 4k, but most do say around 2 k liters.

If its 2k then e.g. in my case this becomes a lot more expensive tho they are a bit cheaper per head and user changeable but on Roland ts just a cost of a head no engineer cost involved anyway for myself, so going with latex sounds are its more expensive as head change and would require frequent changes.

Another Roland printer checking invoices all heads were replaced at nearly same time with just around 2 week difference and each one is at around 12k liters or more with all nozzles perfect still going strong everyday.

Spoke to a local guy who has latex and he also said every few rolls tho its hard to get a better idea of a true consumption to me as some prints could use more then others but he said would change head around every 4/5 rolls.

To any latex users out there is that true ? that the heads only last so little ?

The only spares I keep on my L26500 are heads and inks, Heads £70+vat or more (depending on model) and you’ll need 7 I think on newer ones, I only keep one of each head though (4). In 4 years I’ve only had an engineer out once, a privae engineer. Other times, as I buy from perfect colours, their engineers will help over the phone if needed.

Really nothing to be scared of with latex!

[Colin Crabb]

Heads are warrantied by HP for 2k or X amount of time – only returned 2 heads in 5 years.

On average I’d say heads run 6-7k with no issues (and we run small / fine detailed stuff, so are fussy), but can defo’ run longer!

quote :

Spoke to a local guy who has latex and he also said every few rolls

ekks, that doesn’t sound right – for example in December we ran 10 rolls @ 1370mmm x 50m rolls one after the other printing hi tack safety stickers without a single head change, pictures below are those heads, still in machine… run 12Litres & 10litres :bigsmile:
For us, its all about maintance and looking after the kit – it then looks after you.

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[Deleted User]

Hi.

Thanks for some info guys , sounds as I got some false info then, if warranted to 2k but if they do around 6/8 k then that isn’t that bad considering their cost as opposed solvent head cost and time required to change it and alignment time.

I do also like the sound of the space required from their front face media loading something I wish Roland had possible to save some space around them.

Sounds as worth going and looking into them as I was thinking about HP 570.

Thanks for the correction on the wrong info I had.

[David McDonald]

Hi

From our experience the current models of HP Latex printers allow a far longer life for the print heads than HP states but this was not the case on earlier models (we’ve had one from each model generation since they were introduced).

The issue of not changing the heads "on time" was colour consistency, i.e. if we needed to repair a wrap and the original print was done on heads some margin beyond the recommended life then the original print would have been off the intended colour and the new prints wouldn’t match (notwithstanding other factors like fading etc.). Further wallpaper drops could have slight variances in colour between them. We quickly learned that the problems were completely mitigated by sticking to HP’s recommended print head life (or not too far beyond)

With the 500 series, we benchmark print quality weekly and do image quality maintenance and calibrations regularly, we swap all heads by default when they get around 4.5k. Doing the latter has guaranteed 100% print quality and consistency. We might be able to get the same result by letting the heads go even longer but we just drew the line at that level and have no worries. That’s a fair amount of print sold per head and so the costs aren’t great.

If we were printing product that wasn’t critical in colour consistency then I’d be happy to let the heads keep on going and going and going and going!

We always have extra spare heads and carts in stock as we print a substantial amount and cant afford to lose print time if we get a faulty head/cart when replacing, its happened 3 times.

I’d strongly recommend the 560/570, excellent piece of kit.

Cheers
Dave