Large solids/wheel marks on banners.

[Salmoneye]

I am printing a 4'4" x 10' Black solid on jet flex banner material. I am using all of my grip rollers on a xc-540. The track lines from where the rollers have been are very obvious on the finished print. The ink seems to be accepted differently in those areas. How do you guys deal with this? I have not noticed it this dramatically on other colors etc...

 

[J Hill Designs]

clean your rollers? may have some sort of contaminant on them

 

[Salmoneye]

They are clean, I think that because the banner material is getting squished it is then less receptive to the ink than the other areas and it flashes. The rollers are not marking the media just changing the way the ink looks once it is applied to these areas.

 

[SoCalN8V]

We only use the two outside rollers because of that. And that was what our Roland rep recommended when we bought the printer.

 

[Gino]

Can you see the marks from 5' away ??

Or does the whole thing just read the message intended and your customer is being too fussy ??

 

[signappeal]

Same here, we only use the outer 2 rollers on our xc-540 with no issues.

 

[Salmoneye]

I tried using only the outside 2 rollers but it wants to buckle just a little near the outside roller. The banding is quite pronounced. Is there a tension adjustment for the roller pressure?

 

[james2]

I have also had that problem. There is no pressure adjustment.
I also only use the outside rollers and the clamp on guards to hold the material down. The material does bunch up sometimes. I try to make sure there is enough white border around the print in case the material wanders off track. I also have found myself giving the roll slack befor it is printed and have even spent the printing time pulling on the material to keep it flat. Obviously, this is not what should be happening but have done so just to get a print that does not mess up when these problem occur.

 

[Salmoneye]

I am also using a generic banner profile as i have not found one for jetflex. I have printed red solids, yellow solids... and the tracking is hardly noticeable but with black it is a nightmare.

 

[Malkin]

I have noticed it as well. Does seem to vary a bit with different brands, also darker colors were worse.

I think it's a static issue.

 

[Salmoneye]

Interesting thought Malkin. I wouldn't have thought static because on vinyl I can see the roller marks slightly imprinted so I know that there is a lot of pressure from the rollers. I assumed that the material was compressed and therefore wouldn't accept ink as readily. just next to the roller track the ink seems a little darker than everywhere else and the roller didn't contact there. Maybe there is a static issue. I will try to ground the roll or use some dryer sheets on it and see what happens.

 

[Kentucky Wraps]

I am printing a 4'4" x 10' Black solid on jet flex banner material. I am using all of my grip rollers on a xc-540. The track lines from where the rollers have been are very obvious on the finished print. The ink seems to be accepted differently in those areas. How do you guys deal with this? I have not noticed it this dramatically on other colors etc...

Here's how to fix that...you must only use the outsided rollers...AND when doing so...there are 2 things you have to do with that...
1. Feed out slack in the back so that the 2 pinch rollers aren't fighting the weight of the roll stock...(causes the bunching)
2. Turn down the heat to 86 for print and 100 for dryer. Your banner will be a little more tacky for a bit...so be careful..but that will also eliminate the material bunching...because the banner is mostly plastic and gets REALLY soft when heated even a little. Keep some tension on the front end if you can...until it's long enough to load on the take-up reel. If you don't have a takeup ...sorry...you may need to babysit it. Pull up a chair.
BUT: if you follow steps 1 and 2...you should be fine.