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Truely affordable sign making machine with huge potentential
I have purchased an “affordable” small solvent based flat bed printer , its called the Busjet pro and comes from Korea (Co called Brain Union systems hence the BUS)
the machine is based on , wait for it , the Epson 1290 , but is built like a tank , it weighs in at 65 kg. the cost of the machine is $12,500.00 (We actually got it for about gbp8k )
This is a truly wonderful machine , it can print onto ANYTHING that is 32cm wide , 48 cm long (longer – the 48cm is print area) and up to 10 cm thick. It prints on uneven and rough surfaces.
The print quality and vibrancy of the print has to be the best I have EVER seen on any rigid substrate. !!!!!! It is seriously good and WOWS customers.
The Machine uses bulk inks , and as far as I can determine , uses eco-sol (mild solvent) inks , the same as the Roland machines (the Roland ink costs us about 350 quid a liter , this ink is 100 quid a liter)
Its a 6 colour printer and is an absolute snap to use. If the package you use prints , you can use it!!!.
There is no magic ink (not even UV curable) and thus printing on various items requires that you coat the item with various ink receptive coatings. BUSJET supply a whole range of them , from single part coatings to 2 part heat resistant extremely tough ones. These work well and are a snap to apply with an airbrush or roller , they don’t damage the substrates and are pretty durable. They aren’t expensive , round 50 quid a liter and a liter will cover about 70 a4 pages. However with experimentation , we have discovered easier and much cheaper coatings such as flat white primer , spray on artists fixative and clear or matt lacquers. A lot of substrates don’t need a coating and a lot of them that DO can actually be printed very well if the item is heated prior to printing.
You can print just about ANYTHING!!!!!!!! , I have put whatever I can get my grubby paws on and coat thru this machine with spectacular results. Brass , stainless steel , acrylic , abs , styrene , ceramic tiles , pens , lighters , canvas , fabrics , a t-shirt , ribbon , wood boxes , wood flooring , a sticky tape dispenser , paper , vinyl , anodised aluminium , medals , cellphone covers , you name it , it’s gone thru!!!!!!. The profit possibilities are truly endless with this.
To give an example , we did 20 a4 FULL colour signs on 3mm white acrylic , we sprayed with artists fixative which dries VERY quickly and dries to a nice matt finish. We printed at 720 dpi (the unit can print to 2880 dpi) which gave an exceptionally crisp print. The colours really POP on this machine.
It took approximately 3 minutes a print , FULL coverage.
Cost per print was : Perspex 1 quid , coating (fixative) 15p , ink at 25ml per sq m (1.5ml per print) 18p = about gbp 1.50 per print. We sold them at 9 quid each and the customer was totally orgasmic over what they had got.
We printed 2500 cheap pens , the print area was 3cm x 8mm , the cost of print was well under 1 p , actually about 1/2 a pence and we charged 20p a pen which was well under 1/2 the price of a 4 colour screen or pad print with NO setup charges!!!!
We laid the pens out in a super A3 template we made with our laser and got 36 up. Time to print each pen was less than 5 secs and we managed 540 pens an hour. It took 1/2 a day to complete this job. 500 quid for it at a total cost of about 13 quid in consumables (apart from the labor of coating and loading the templates , which worked out to about 12 quid)
The way this machine works is simple. You print a grid on a piece of paper taped to the bed , you load the article on the grid , press the auto button and the bed raises and a sensor senses the article and its height and once done , you press print.
The bed itself moves with the article on it , once finished you just load the next item , either press auto (or you can manually set the height of the bed for unusual shaped items) or you can program the machine with a time delay to load the next item and reprint at the same position for multiple jobs of the same print.
We have had one or 2 issues with the machine , some hardware and software bugs which have been fixed very quickly
Even tho the mnfgr is in Korea , service and fitting instructions for the one or 2 retrofits have been excellent. The heads , dampers , capping station etc are available from ANY epson printer service center and are cheap. The manual comes with photos and instructions of how to change these if needed (we haven’t needed). One needs to check the nozzles occasionally if you haven’t printed for a long while , and if blocked , a few head cleans clears this (head cleaning as in normal printer head cleans). The driver is an Epson 1290 driver.
In terms of durability: If using one of the more specialised 2 part coatings , durability is exceptional , it takes major scraping with a sharp object to damage the print. We print onto ceramic tiles using this coating , whilst I wouldn’t use the tile as a floor tile as this is about the harshest abuse you can give it , we would use it as a wall tile. We have a customer who wants to use the tiles as restaurant table surfaces (an amazing application , the table surface has the branding) and he has put a few tiles thru an extensive 2 week torture test and they have come out perfectly.
Direct printing onto substrates is exceptionally durable depending on the substrate and how it accepts inks. Cheap lighters for example print directly but have little durability due to the plastics used. Coated with artists fixative and then print , they are more than adequately rub resistant for the life of the lighter and beyond that , same with cheap plastic pens. I wouldn’t print on something like a metal Zippo and expect the print to last the unlimited lifetime of the lighter.
In terms of signage , the print is VERY durable , obviously if one wants to damage it , one can!!!.
Should you want to do stuff like printed aluminium plates that would go on an industrial machine that is being cleaned by aggressive chemicals , one can apply a polyurethane coating which will allow the plate to survive. But for general outdoor use or display purposes , nothing is needed. We can only remove the print by scratching it with a blade.
The applications are endless with this machine. We have just produced samples printed onto the pine lids of wine packaging boxes produced for one of the major wine makers here , a full colour print of his bottle and its label. Its a 25cm x 9 cm print and transforms the box from a cheap packing item into a “work of art” , the print is ultra realistic and it sets this box apart from ANYTHING else in a liquor store – the initial inquiry is to do 20 000 of these with one specific vintage – 35 secs to print at 360 dpi (more than adequate) at a cost of less than 15 p , selling price to the wine maker is 75p and they are more than happy to pay.
This is an expensive machine , but IMHO it is a fantastic investment. -
8 Replies
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Heh, I spellchecked everything barring the title of my post , sing = Sign
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sorted 😉
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Robert , thanks
Initially I thought I had made a mistake with this machine , now I’m thinking banks of em 😉 -
i will put it on the xmas list it could be well handy
chris
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sounds great Rod, any contact details
Cheers
paul
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Rod is this the machine you said would print T Shirts as well. You sent me info before but I have been so busy I forgot to look
Regards Adrian
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Do a google search for busjet pro 603 or busjet pro.
It does print directly onto fabrics , but t-shirts are problematic to position and some fabrics soak the inks up immediately leading to slight fuzziness.
I printed on stuff like silk and polyester with variable results. If you can spray the fabric with fixative , then it prints perfectly , but I dunno what the wash or wear resistance is. will try some today and report back. -
Thanks Rod
REgards Adrian
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