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Question Help me pick a Mimaki rinter

Gary Wiant

New Member
I'm in the process of picking a new Mimaki printer, coming from a JV300-160. Here are thr printers I'm looking at and my concerns.

JV330-160 - great printer but only offers 2 liter bulk bags & I'm not sure we can use up the 2 liter before it expires.

JV100-160 - Seems like a good option but I'm concerned with print speed. I don't need the speed of the 330 but I don't want much slower than the 300. Also I'm concerned with the fact that the phrase "entry level" pops up. I'm concerned we will would wear it b out prematurely.

UCJV300-160 - My concerns with this printer is its been out about 6 years & I'm concerned about being discontinued now that the ucjv330 have been an released, also I'm not sure about ink life & the ability to wrap vehicles with Lus170 or Lus200 inks


Lastly the ucjv100 - 160 plus -my concerns with this machine are the same as the JV100 speed & the UCJV Ink life as well as the ability to wrap vehicles with the prints.


Thanks
Gary
 

micadesign

New Member
if you do vehicles wraps i would go with the jv330-160 with no doubt.
i have 2 jv300-160, 1 cjv150-160 all with 2 liter bags and do not issue with ink expiration.
i have a ucjv300-160 too. it's a great printer but damm slow. ink setup i have cmyk CLCL WW... normally clear runs out of date, cause i do not use much. the other colors are fine, including white. uv prints i do not use for wraps. i use lus 170 inks.
 
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Solventinkjet

DIY Printer Fixing Guide
There's no official end of service date for the UCJV300 but the UCJV150 model's end of service date is 2027. I'd assume the UCJV300, which they made many more of, will be similar or longer.
 

dudeinthemoon

New Member
UCJV330 much worse than UCJV300, unfortunately, the only benefit of 330 over 300 it’s speed, but reliability and printing quality just awful, at least for now. Epson printheads are good with solvent or water ink, but terrible on uv.
 

dudeinthemoon

New Member
Strange choice to be honest, JV100 is cheap, but slow, good as second machine, but as main working horse it’s too simple, ideal for start.
Absolutely no point to put 8 colors in it - all prints will be super slow, no draft profiles for this inkset, and orange will kill your printhead in 1 year. 2xCMYK is the way to go.
But I would consider UCJV300, or JV330 with no slitter
 

Gary Wiant

New Member
Why do you think orange will kill the print head in a year? I have taken to lots of people who won't wrap with a UCJV, I would buy a jv330 if it didn't have to use bulk ink.
 

dudeinthemoon

New Member
Because I have seen it a lot, without proper additional maintenance, with no recirculation orange ink usually kills the head in 1-2 years, depends on how often you printing
 

Smoke_Jaguar

Man who touches printers inappropriately.
Does the orange ink have a particularly abrasive/corrosive pigment in it? Or is it a high pigment ink like white? Never really noticed issues with orange pigmented ink being a particular problem. However, my experience with orange is just on Epson TFP printheads with aqueous ink, never on a Mimaki.
 

micadesign

New Member
UCJV330 much worse than UCJV300, unfortunately, the only benefit of 330 over 300 it’s speed, but reliability and printing quality just awful, at least for now. Epson printheads are good with solvent or water ink, but terrible on uv.
can you show us an example?
 

FrankW

New Member
I have tried the JV330 live. If you look for a good solvent printer I would suggest Epson SC-S60600L/80600L.
 

John Miller

New Member
After lots of research, I'm buying a Mimaki JV100-160. Thank you to everyone who replied
Gary, I have a CJV 150-160 with the 8 color setup. the color gamut is great but the printer runs slow. My 10 year old Roland was faster. I'd keep that in mind if I were you. Good luck.
 

Goatshaver

Shaving goats and eating bushes
UCJV330 much worse than UCJV300, unfortunately, the only benefit of 330 over 300 it’s speed, but reliability and printing quality just awful, at least for now. Epson printheads are good with solvent or water ink, but terrible on uv.
Why do you think this? Have you been using a per-releae model of the 330? I'm considering getting a 330 over the 300 right now, but I also know adopting new tech can also come with some headaches. It's 30% faster than the 300 and a smaller dot (4pl down from 7pl on the 300). Also sounds like they revamped the UV lamp setup and a lot of software functionality.
 

Smoke_Jaguar

Man who touches printers inappropriately.
Last I checked, they haven't even released pricing on the UCJV330. That said, one thing I HATE about early printers is that there is rarely a cheap way to get revised parts for cheap to fix the screwups. Like updating a UJF from a wiper nozzle to a suction nozzle for better head reliability, $3K in parts to do a silly retrofit like that. I have a very early UCJV300 and it also has some weird firmware bugs, and always a pain to mess with that.
 
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