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Falcon Banding

Hey everyone, we recently picked up a falcon 46 for a really good price and since have replaced both print heads, all dampers, maintenance station, t-fence, all the o-rings in the lines and put new mutoh ink in it. As you can see in the pictures we are getting a weird banding. The heads seal up awesome with no air or anything. We are using flexi8-pro. Has anyone else run into this problem? We were thinking the only thing let to change is the headboard. Any help would be greatly appreciated!
Thanks!
 

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Jackpine

New Member
Check your heat settings, they may be too high. 45/45 is a good place to start. Try printing 720dpi x 720dpi bi-directional then unidirectional. I have a Falcon 38" and print 720 x 720 bi-directional with the heaters as high as the material will let me without it buckling.
 
I've played with the heat settings and haven't had much luck. I have noticed banners looks pretty good but I think it's because the banding blends in with the banner pattern. It just seems like when it isn't a color other than black, red, blue, or green that it looks kind of fuzzy.
 

dtdm

New Member
My 46 will print like this when there is an excessive build up of static on the material.
Try a dryer sheet, rub it all over the place! (back roller/back of machine/I even tend to lightly do the vinyl itself.

I run a humidifier in my print room to keep humidity up, and also some anti static spray on the way.
 
How big of a humidifier do you have? I do notice everything I touch I get shocked in our whole shop from the printer to the plotter. I did have dryer sheets on the back of the machine lightly touching the vinyl as it goes in. I have tried different profiles and DPI settings. All seems to still have that banding and over spray look.
 
Yes the only time it looked half way decent on PSA was when I had the set adjustment was like -3.45 which would make it way short over the course of a 8' print. The rip is just the Flexi8 Rip.
 
What I have done is adjust the step adjustment on the printer then used the output size compensation in Flexi to correct the length of the print. Between doing this and lowering my fixer heat setting has made a big difference when I was having a similar problem.
 
The static seemed to help a good bit but we still have some minor banding. The new headboard will be in tomorrow so I can keep you posted on if it helps or not.
AJ
 
Replaced the head board and it seems to pint a little better. Just have a some very minor banding and over spray but other than that it looks pretty good.
 

dtdm

New Member
Sorry for the delay,
As far as humidifier goes, I'm running a smaller one (only a 20x27 ft room).
I try to keep humidity up over 60%.

I have hardwood floors (which play into static).
I recently checked my ground on my sockets... Seemed my wall outlet I was using didn't have a ground. Wired one in today...

Check your wall outlet, with one of those 3 led indicators you can get at a hardware store for a few dollars. It will tell you if your socket is grounded or not.

I have considered putting printer on a static dispersant mat. Also thinking about adding my own grounds to the printer.
I know my problem is static... because two of my plotters are doing the same thing.

The banding could be a clogged nozzle which would be a separate problem.
 
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