Media Bowing Issues L360

[dan1942]

I am having issues with media bowing on our 360. I spent last week adjusting the straightness optimization settings for the media (3m IJ 35c) after finally getting figured out I thought all was good. I tried to print some small decals today using that material and all the contour cuts are off again. the settings I adjusted are still saved, I am not getting it does the material change on a day to day basis? I am printing with a long bar registration mark for my summa cutter.
Does anyone have suggestions for a fairly inexpensive Polymeric vinyl that will work with this printer maybe that will help with the heat? It seems a lot of manufacturers are not stating which ones are polymeric or monomeric.
thanks again

 

[massfactor]

i know what your problem is. I own a L26500, mimaki jv-33 and a summa cutter, the problem is HEAT. when the vinyl gets warm it can expand and contract, usually in the middle of the vinyl, even a little bit too much is enough to throw the summa reg bar off when contour cutting. you can get away easier with bigger contour jobs but decals have to be perfect and have very little play.Try this, take the vinyl you just printed, put it in the summa, run the OPOS eye/light along the registration bar, push the head along the width of the reg bar, if it doesn't line up your contour cuts will be off.
get the heat down to a point that it drys the ink but doesn't bow or cycle the vinyl. Its hard to do it on a latex but on my v33 i had to turn down my pre heater to 40 deg. and my post heat down to 36-38 deg, just enough to make it dry to the touch. Even with my JV-33 if the heat is up to high it will warp the reg mark. it took me a while to figure out but i hope this help

Good luck
Mass Factor Media

 

[AF]

Just for laughs, have you recently calibrated OPOS? It may be out of alignment.

 

[dan1942]

Thanks for the help! I will try to that with the head to check. I did run the OPOS calibration as well which made no difference. I will try lowering the heat some more I guess. Do you guys have the same issue with a cast material or polymeric calendared vinyl?

 

[AF]

I have not had this issue with any vinyl. Set the machine to "force OPOS xy" and always use the correct barcode. Without seeing a screen capture of your rip settings and a picture of the media, it is impossible to know if your equipment is configured correctly.

You can get an OPOS test plot from Summa to verify the sensor is aligned with the knife.

 

[ProColorGraphics]

I have had that issue with cheap vinyl but now with IJ35/C. The problem with cheap vinyl seems to be that the paper is thinner and cheaper, makes sense, which causes the vinyl to "bow" more. I have ran jobs that screw up with cheap stuff and they cut out great with IJ35. I have one job I have to do on cheap stuff to get the price where they need it and with that I have to set the S/O to -2.6 to get them to cut out decent. It doesn't help that they are 1.5" by 36" decals, so they run back and forth a lot in the cutter. I have not ran these on my L360 yet though.

 

[dan1942]

Has anyone in here used the scale print width or height in media manager (Onyx 11) to adjust for bowing instead of using the front panel of the printer? this was suggested to me I am going to try it in the morning

 

[BIG EASY DOES IT]

I wouldn't change any settings. I would get my printing to the point where it doesn't bow. Heat is your problem. You are using too much heat. If you can't get it dry without going hotter up your passes. The material will spend a longer time in the heating area. Usually more passess means less heat. People are trying to shove stuff through the printer too fast. Do extra passes with lower ink saturation and then you can also up the passes without increasing ink coverage. You have to play with it. I can send you my profile for IJ35 and you can see if that works. We print on it all the time without any issues. Print and cut also and all decals are the same. Send me your email.