HELP!! Reflective

[sar bossier]

Hey there, all! I am hoping someone can help me - I printed 30" x 10' run of text on reflective, for MY shop truck. Laminated, and my Roland SC545EX can't read the 3rd or 4th crop marks. I have done a search here, and have taken the advice of putting matte lam over the 4 marks, to no avail.

My question: Is 10' run too long for the machine to read? I know with all other vinyls, my machine reads 10' runs all day long, but THIS time, it won't. I have cleaned the encoder strip several times, it will read the first 2 marks, but not the last 2.

HELP???!!

 

[HulkSmash]

Hey there, all! I am hoping someone can help me - I printed 30" x 10' run of text on reflective, for MY shop truck. Laminated, and my Roland SC545EX can't read the 3rd or 4th crop marks. I have done a search here, and have taken the advice of putting matte lam over the 4 marks, to no avail.

My question: Is 10' run too long for the machine to read? I know with all other vinyls, my machine reads 10' runs all day long, but THIS time, it won't. I have cleaned the encoder strip several times, it will read the first 2 marks, but not the last 2.

HELP???!!

Try masking tape over the area of the crop mark, and then draw it on with pen.

 

[CS-SignSupply]

Does the printer stop before getting to the third (upper left) mark?

What prompt is on the LCD?

 

[CheapVehicleWrap]

try shining flashlight on it. maybe bowing there?

 

[Sign Works]

This is real basic but are you sure there is sufficent media left past the last crop marks to keep the media sensor covered?

 

[sar bossier]

This is real basic but are you sure there is sufficent media left past the last crop marks to keep the media sensor covered?

The material is 30" - the print is 25.8" - we centered it on the media, then put a 4" strip of plain vinyl along the (as you face the machine) left edge, to extend the width on that side (away from the heads), thinking that would help. As I said, it will read the very first mark, carry over across the material, find and read the 2nd mark, but when it travels the 10' to the 3rd mark, it never sees it, and keeps going. Does that make sense?

 

[Sign Works]

The material is 30" - the print is 25.8" - we centered it on the media, then put a 4" strip of plain vinyl along the (as you face the machine) left edge, to extend the width on that side (away from the heads), thinking that would help. As I said, it will read the very first mark, carry over across the material, find and read the 2nd mark, but when it travels the 10' to the 3rd mark, it never sees it, and keeps going. Does that make sense?

Not really following why you would add additional vinyl to the side, I think the 30" material would be sufficent for 25.8" image and crop marks. Here is a quick diagram showing what I was refering to, you need enough before and after front and rear crop marks in order to keep the media sensors covered. It's approx. 3"-4" on my SP-300V

 

[anotherdog]

If it is running past the marks it sounds like the file has corrupted. It should hunt for the marks in the right position. Try dropping the file in again and re ripping it. If it is the same it will find the marks of the first job.
Another option is to create just the cut file in your design program to the same size as the original printed file. Set the rip to use the print/cut crop marks and it should go to the same cut positions.

 

[HulkSmash]

Not really following why you would add additional vinyl to the side, I think the 30" material would be sufficent for 25.8" image and crop marks. Here is a quick diagram showing what I was refering to, you need enough before and after front and rear crop marks in order to keep the media sensors covered. It's approx. 3"-4" on my SP-300V

if that's the case wouldn't just roll off the cutter? That's what mines does it there isn't sufficient room in front of or behind the crop marks. Sounds like it's not reading the crop marks.

 

[sar bossier]

I have 7" in front of the first 2 marks, and a little under a foot past the back 2 marks. I originally added the vinyl, as the right side top and bottom marks are somewhat close to the edge, but have since removed the added vinyl. Getting ready to do some coloring if this doesn't read this pass try - I like the idea Colorado gave, with masking tape - I'll try it if this pass doesn't work.

 

[sar bossier]

Ok, SO - Masking tape didn't help, it still won't read the last 2 marks. Gonna re-print it in sections.

 

[Mike Paul]

Sounds like the material in skewing/walking right or left and by the time it gets to the back of the print the printer misses the marks completely.

Put a 1/8in. strip of vinyl on the front of the machine (Dryer) and use that to align your material to see how much it skews.

If your print is 10 ft. long, align the material from the center 5ft. in and then use the arrow key to roll the material to the front. This will cut your skewing in half if that's your problem.

Replace the wheels on your pinch rollers if there old.

 

[lkt1954]

I just went through something just like this. Printed 10' of reflective, laminated it and spent the next 4 hours trying to get it to read the crop marks. It would skew up to 2" from front to back. If I remember right Roland says the versacamms are accurate within 1/8" per foot- 10' = 1 1/4" variance from front to back. Funny thing I have run 9-10' jobs on regular vinyl that were print,laminate, then cut and had no problem. My guess is reflective is more subject to skewing due to its properties. Ended up doing the job in 2- 5' sections small overlap and 10' in the air you will never know it. IMHO reflective sucks.

Larry

 

[ProWraps]

heh. i know this issue well. turn down the laser level.

 

[sar bossier]

heh. i know this issue well. turn down the laser level.

Hey, Pro - We tried that, and turning the lights off, tried the center align suggestion, all to no avail. We measured each crop mark to the edges, and found it walked when printing 1/8". Tried loading slightly skewed, nothing worked. Ended up splitting the prints (as suggested) into 2 - 5' sections. Gonna cut it this afternoon. Posting this so it can maybe help others in future, facing this dilemna - print reflective in smaller sections than normal vinyl.

I REALLY hate wasting vinyl, especially this vinyl - 3m just went up in price

 

[HulkSmash]

heh. i know this issue well. turn down the laser level.

hey foo.

how you do that on the graphtec?

 

[Kentucky Wraps]

When that happens to me...I mess with the light in the print room...usually standing in front of it and holding my hands in front of the area..blocking light..but not too dark. That usually helps. The worst is when it's printing, and gets to the last crop marks and gets a scan motor error before printing them. FFFFffffuuu

 

[boxerbay]

we had a similar issue when using high gloss laminate. what we did was sand down/or with high grit sand paper the area over the crop marks to knock down the gloss.

 

[boxerbay]

hey foo.

how you do that on the graphtec?

menu - #2 - down 3 - then #3 sensing level.

 

[RobbyMac]

Man we just print a bunch of crop marks every once in a while (in waste space/unsused space during jobs). Then cut em up and store for 'sticking' on top of chrome, reflective, etc.

Although we'd probably not have crop marks large enough for a 10' run, so we'd probably hand draw some.