JV3 160-S DIY head replacement not so hard

[robracer]

After snapping off the ink port on the black / magenta head we decided to do some emergency work to get the printer working again, now in the past its call the tech to come out bend us over, but this time we thought with nothing to loose we would thrown in an old head that just had a few nozzles out as we had to keep printing. We are used to replacing pumps dampers etc but have never done a head before & thought it cant be too hard..... well after removing the broken one we chucked in the old head did up the 2 screws replaced the dampers & did a test print..... had to laugh.... it actually printed so I did a 20 min nozzle soak & did another test print... whoaaa! we had a perfect nozle test print across all colours :-0 so the next test was to do another print of what was a run of 65 - 1.3 x 1.7mtr posters..... Whoaaaa...... it printed perfect (insert happy dance) so with no head calibration we were able to resume printing in less than 10 minuites. I will be saving my old heads from now on.... I never thought we would bring one back from the dead least not one that been sitting on the shelf for over a year with no cleaning or soaking.
I am so glad that we have had the courage to try to work on the printer ourselves, not only do we save money but we can also get out of dificuilty quickly when down time is not viable..... Here I was thinking of replacing the printer..... no way .... we are going to run this one into the ground
we are waiting to do some other prints to see if the calibration is necessasry but at this stage it looks like we can cheat & not have it done. without a search is there a download available for the service manual on the JV3- 160S ? obviously doing our own calibration is the next step.

 

[jjwstar]

good 4 u....i have been wanting to change 1 or maybe 2 heads myself for awhile now. just worry about messing it up. how much did you pay for the head? did you get it through mimaki?

 

[robracer]

good 4 u....i have been wanting to change 1 or maybe 2 heads myself for awhile now. just worry about messing it up. how much did you pay for the head? did you get it through mimaki?

We buy all our parts including heads from China, Heads approx $550 US
Pumps $35 US I will look up the supplier when I can & post up the details.
Oh & these seem to be OEM parts....we cant find any difference except no serial numbers on the end of the heads, not that this has been a problem.

 

[robracer]

Getting our parts from:
www.superinkjet.cn

Heads $560
Dampers $8
Pumps $35

Including delivery.. 4-5 days from China to Australia

 

[Robert M]

Print heads

We stock them here in the States at $825.00. These heads do have the head rank sticker on them. we also offer free tech support
www.solventinkjet.com

 

[robracer]

We stock them here in the States at $825.00. These heads do have the head rank sticker on them. we also offer free tech support
www.solventinkjet.com

So why would I spend another $265 per head just for the head rank sticker when we can get good results without them, I suggest you do the sales pitch in another thread as this one is about saving money, thanks anyway.

 

[J Hill Designs]

because when the head rank sticker is there, you can input the correct head rank when changing heads...

 

[robracer]

Yep & with the printing we are doing its not necessary, we have been able to do a great variety of Stickers, banners, posters, vector & full colour high res prints + PMS matches all with no head rank input..... works for us anyway.