Anyone here have the Jv5? Thoughts on it?

[Matt Cuellar]

matt> please see my comment

service can NOT always be blamed on the vendor, but the distributor that deals the equipment...as we are able to get the service from Mimaki much faster than an end user can, and pass that service on to you....if your distributor values you as a customer, they will get the service you need.

I completely agree. I was not insinuating anything by this post. I have never seen a JV5 in production, never demoed one, etc so I have no idea what they're like. I just found it interesting when I came across the post, that's all.

 

[mimakitech24]

No I didn't say you were, just didn't want a bad article to sway your opinion. You really should check one out in production...they are great machines!

 

[Robert72]

Dear MimakiTech, I didn't buy my JV5 in China neither I bought from the cheapest dealer. My machine came from DigiDelta, that's the only official way to buy one JV5 in Spain or Portugal. It's supposed that they supply the technical support. Well, taking account they never came to my facilities, I had to look for another technician to maintain my machine.

That has nothing to do with price, it's more related to a serious company, or more appropiate, the lack of. They lie, lie and lie. You tell there some FCOs, ok, they always told me "there's nothing to upgrade". So if somebody by here asks me about a Mimaki, I cannot tell him, "go and buy it, you'll not be disappointed".

 

[MachServTech]

Yes Mixed

As a solvent tech I too have some misgivings when someone asks me about purchasing a Mimaki JV5... I agree they can be good production machines, but the way they were engineered leaves something to be desired...and techs hate FCOs or field upgrades or retrofits or any of that Appolo 13 fix-it-with-some-duct-tape while traveling at 76000 miles per hour- crap! <end venting>
I have seen the Mimaki JV5 print beautifully fast....and have seen it sent off to the glue factory
One thing is for certian...I dont like to work on em!

 

[mimakitech24]

As i stated toward the end of that post, the new machines have taken care of all the problems, we installed one of these about 6 months ago, and its been running beautifully since! It was only the earlier machines that required all of this work...

there are a lot of products from every industry that need to have upgrades...
(cough) vista (cough), software patches for misswritten programs...etc, everything from a-z, but usually once these upgrades come out, the product works beautifully,
>>>i.e. the JV-5

and, yes, it is the dealer 75% of the time, i know this first hand, and have been told our company has awesome support compared to some other dealers, which of course it always great to hear after a hard days work

 

[MachServTech]

mimakitech24 I have to disagree. If you release a machine into the industry that requires that much retrofit...you are bound to piss some people off. Mimaki has nowhere near the dominance in the industry (following your Microsoft analogy) to afford that level of indifference and arrogance.
Also what happens as these machines start to go out of warranty?...no doubt you will be very busy.
As for me I am done with their lack of documentation and communication.

 

[Printhead]

I have been operating one for 1 year now. It has many flaws; bidirectional sucks and can't be used for paneling, won't dry (you have to buy a good external heater), the take up roll is shit and not reliable, weak gamut, many resolution available but the only one looking good is 1080x540, very smelly, expensive ink, very difficult to print on perforated media, good quality is with 12passes and more. And I'm forgetting some.

This machine needs getting used to, and once it's set up to print good the speed is reduced almost to the speed of a jv33. I'm curious about the updated version thought, I heard they have new printheads but the techs here wouldn't admit it.

 

[ScotJ]

I have been operating one for 1 year now. It has many flaws; bidirectional sucks and can't be used for paneling, won't dry (you have to buy a good external heater), the take up roll is shit and not reliable, weak gamut, many resolution available but the only one looking good is 1080x540, very smelly, expensive ink, very difficult to print on perforated media, good quality is with 12passes and more. And I'm forgetting some.

This machine needs getting used to, and once it's set up to print good the speed is reduced almost to the speed of a jv33. I'm curious about the updated version thought, I heard they have new printheads but the techs here wouldn't admit it.

I agree on the bidirectional issue - even with endless config, can't seem to get a solid print.

Same goes on the up-take system, I really think they should come out with a new unit for this machine. I NEVER have problems like this with my JV33 uptake reel.

However- I don't agree that it is as slow as the JV33. Even in 16 pass mode the machine is way faster than 8 pass mode, with better quality coming from the JV5. So long as its calibrated right, you can run "fast" speed setting and achieve great quality.

And when it comes to printing banner, the JV5 Leaves the Jv33 in the dust. I can run 6 pass mode 540x1080 fast uni-dir, and get 290+ sq ft per hour with great quality.

 

[Printhead]

I'm sorry, I have no experience with the JV-33, I just pulled that out of my ass.

 

[Scot_J]

I'm sorry, I have no experience with the JV-33, I just pulled that out of my ass.

LOL - no biggy. But yea, the JV33 is as slow as running the JV5 in 32 pass mode, slow, uni directional and then some.