How to get rid of media buckling when printing 98" or wider?

[F1225hgB42w]

Hello All -

We have a 126" CET Hybrid printer. We have found a need for printing media larger than 98" quite often, but we see a common problem when printing on larger media, the material seems to buckle in the middle which creates headstrikes! The CET does come with a dancer bar on the back, and it the attached photos you will see I've tried the dancer bar two different ways, but it doesn't seem to make a difference/correct the issue. This issues occurs the most on Mesh Banner - Strip Mesh Pro from Ultraflex. Does anyone have a solution to this issue?

Attached are photos of what I mean when I say "buckling".

 

[Scotchy]

Don't have a solution but we have the same problem with our H1625LED. We were actually talking about this, this morning. My theory is the surface under the belt isn't truly flat or the roller isn't truly flat causing the media to become narrow over a number of feet. We often have to baby it to finish long banners. Quite frustrating....

 

[SignMeUpGraphics]

Ouch... doesn't look great.
Does the CET have a vacuum function on the roll to roll side, or just the bed?
Our Arizona has a full length vacuum platen on the RMO, so we haven't seen this issue on any width roll yet.

 

[F1225hgB42w]

Don't have a solution but we have the same problem with our H1625LED. We were actually talking about this, this morning. My theory is the surface under the belt isn't truly flat or the roller isn't truly flat causing the media to become narrow over a number of feet. We often have to baby it to finish long banners. Quite frustrating....

Hi Scotchy -

Thanks for the response. I am not surprised your VuTek has the same issues - the frames for the CET and the Vuteks (our at least that is what I have been told) are made in the same factory before being shipped to CET/VuTek to be customized by the manufacturers - so they use the same media and belt system for the hybrids. I could be wrong, but isn't the H1625LED a 64" wide printer? We run a lot of 63" mesh and don't see this issue, it doesn't really come into play until we get to 98" or wider - which I was told was because when Ultraflex (or more appropriately - the Chinese factories that actually make the banner materials) manufactures the materials that the middle of the wider rolls tend to sag which creates more tension on the edges and that is why we see this buckling when printing because the material is slightly longer in the middle of the rolls compared to the edges... but I just feel like there has to be a solution I don't know of yet! If I find a solution I'll be sure to post it!

Best of luck to you!

 

[F1225hgB42w]

Ouch... doesn't look great.
Does the CET have a vacuum function on the roll to roll side, or just the bed?
Our Arizona has a full length vacuum platen on the RMO, so we haven't seen this issue on any width roll yet.

Hi SignMeUpGraphics -

Thanks for the response, we also have an Arizona (actually it's a Fuji Acuity - but they are just rebranded Oce Arizonas), and both printers have vacuums, but the vuccum in the CET is substantially stronger (two vacuums that are several times stronger than the vaccum on the Fuji we have). Unfortunately the vacuum doesn't solve that problem. Also, the Fuji/Arizonas RMO only allow for media up to 87" (or at least that is what our option is), and we don't see this issue on smaller rolls (72" or 63" rolls), it's only on the 98" and wider rolls - do you print that wide on your Arizona?

 

[Scotchy]

DSIG, it certainly makes sense. Yes it is 64" We have see this in 54" rolls. It has four separate vacuum areas. We haven't played with those much but I was thinking of putting the two center ones on high and the outer ones on ultra low. It makes us nervous running long banners because we know that it's likely to occur. It does seem to happen more in 13oz vinyl than paper stock. We will probably have someone come out and take a look at it because we are still under contract. If they fix it I will be sure to post something.

 

[ExecuPrintGS]

We have the 64" CET hybrid and get the same issues. Its very frustrating.

 

[F1225hgB42w]

We have the 64" CET hybrid and get the same issues. Its very frustrating.

Hi ExecuPrint -

I agree, very frustrating! This last month we've had to print 28,000 sq. ft. of mesh banner and it's killing our productivity - plus we have to have an operator stand and watch the printer and work to keep wrinkles/buckling to a minimum on the back of the printer.

I've never been to a show with CET, but looking at photos from SGIA it looks like they run 126" rolls on their machines and don't suffer this problem so they might know how to get rid of this problem, I'm going to contact their office for assistance. If I find a solution I'll be sure to share it.

Thanks!

 

[tylercrum]

We just got the 126" hybrid a few months ago and had the same issue. We thought for sure we were doing something wrong...glad I'm not crazy. I'll be following this to see what you find out.

 

[F1225hgB42w]

We just got the 126" hybrid a few months ago and had the same issue. We thought for sure we were doing something wrong...glad I'm not crazy. I'll be following this to see what you find out.

Hi Tylercrum -

What type of 126" hybrid did you get? Glad I could help, it's driving us crazy here!

 

[Solventinkjet]

I'm a big fan of feed and take-up systems on printers bigger than 64". A good example would be the heavy duty take-up and feed system on the Mutoh 2638. It basically senses when the roll has tension on it and automatically rolls off a little bit more vinyl off the roll. It does the same on the take-up side. This way, the same amount of tension(or lack of tension) is on the media running through the printer at all times.

 

[tylercrum]

The CET, we have the same printer.

 

[davecich]

The CET, we have the same printer.

The material ripples because the belt moves. If under warranty, place a service call.

 

[SignMeUpGraphics]

Hi SignMeUpGraphics -

Thanks for the response, we also have an Arizona (actually it's a Fuji Acuity - but they are just rebranded Oce Arizonas), and both printers have vacuums, but the vuccum in the CET is substantially stronger (two vacuums that are several times stronger than the vaccum on the Fuji we have). Unfortunately the vacuum doesn't solve that problem. Also, the Fuji/Arizonas RMO only allow for media up to 87" (or at least that is what our option is), and we don't see this issue on smaller rolls (72" or 63" rolls), it's only on the 98" and wider rolls - do you print that wide on your Arizona?

I was just taking a wild stab in the dark unfortunately. As you correctly state, you can't print wider than 87" on an Arizona so it sounds like there is something "special" about going over that width.
I do hope you find a solution soon.

 

[tylercrum]

The material ripples because the belt moves. If under warranty, place a service call.

What do you mean?

 

[F1225hgB42w]

I'm a big fan of feed and take-up systems on printers bigger than 64". A good example would be the heavy duty take-up and feed system on the Mutoh 2638. It basically senses when the roll has tension on it and automatically rolls off a little bit more vinyl off the roll. It does the same on the take-up side. This way, the same amount of tension(or lack of tension) is on the media running through the printer at all times.

Hi VanderJ -

I'm not familiar with that printer but thanks for your feedback. The CET also allows for back and front tension and uses a dancer bar, but our training on the machine was done by the sales rep who sold the machine to us - I hope we can get better training and support when we visit CET for the printer training class in December!

 

[F1225hgB42w]

I was just taking a wild stab in the dark unfortunately. As you correctly state, you can't print wider than 87" on an Arizona so it sounds like there is something "special" about going over that width.
I do hope you find a solution soon.

Hi SignMeUpGrpahics -

Yes, we see that the media is harder to load correctly on larger rolls (slight skew of the media, sag in the middle, etc). Thanks for your suggestion and best of luck to you.

Thanks!

 

[F1225hgB42w]

The material ripples because the belt moves. If under warranty, place a service call.

Hi davecice -

I'll PM you about belt movement - I've had some issues with it recently and I don't want to publically "throw anyone under the bus", but have a lot to discuss with CET.

Aso for the comment, what do you mean? We are under warranty and had a CET tech at our shop in Seattle, WA Tuesday and Wednesday of this week!

 

[F1225hgB42w]

Hi all -

I was contacted by CET yesterday, and it turns out davecice doesn't work for CET anymore. He has left CET and started a new company called Vanguard Digital. Basically CET wasn't too happy about davecice commenting on what is going on. After speaking with the NW sales rep (because our office is a suburb of Seattle) I was told she would send me an email about my questions I had on the new CET ink (which it looks like @tylercrum is using https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hYvId5KuAvg), and have the product support manager call me to schedule a tech to come fix my belt moving issue (which hopefully will fix the buckling). I'm still waiting but will update the post if this does happen and it does fix the belt moving.

@tylercrum - do you like the new mosaic inks? How is your quiet shutter (seems a non issue since the vacuum is so loud compared to the shutter sound)?

Thanks!

 

[tylercrum]

We obviously just got the printer a few months ago, so we've ONLY run the mosaic inks, so I don't have a 'comparison opinion'. But we like the Mosaic inks. We haven't really run into any colors that we NEEDED to get to that we couldn't (I am also a big proponent of managing customer expectations when it comes to digital colors vs offset spot colors....). No adhesion issues at all so far (we print on coro, foam, acm, paper, vinyl, mdo, aluminum, cardboard etc).
The shutters on the lamps are quieter than the printers I looked at in atlanta when I went for a demo, but like you said, it's kind of a non-issue. Everything in our shop is freaking loud, myself included, so the quiet shutters is like putting a silencer on a chainsaw...
We like the printer, we've had a couple little issues, but they've been all over it fixing them (and to be honest, I think the couple issues we've had were due to the third party we bought the printer from and not CET).

Hi all -

I was contacted by CET yesterday, and it turns out davecice doesn't work for CET anymore. He has left CET and started a new company called Vanguard Digital. Basically CET wasn't too happy about davecice commenting on what is going on. After speaking with the NW sales rep (because our office is a suburb of Seattle) I was told she would send me an email about my questions I had on the new CET ink (which it looks like @tylercrum is using https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hYvId5KuAvg), and have the product support manager call me to schedule a tech to come fix my belt moving issue (which hopefully will fix the buckling). I'm still waiting but will update the post if this does happen and it does fix the belt moving.

@tylercrum - do you like the new mosaic inks? How is your quiet shutter (seems a non issue since the vacuum is so loud compared to the shutter sound)?

Thanks!