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Mimaki jv33 ink contamination

gixxer2004

New Member
I have severe ink contamination on my mimaki jv33. Running triangle ecosolvent inks. All cartridges are 50 % or more full.

So far I have done the following:

new cap top
New pump (for mutoh falcon)
new dampers

Any suggestions as to what to check next?
 

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Solventinkjet

DIY Printer Fixing Guide
Make sure the waste tubes are not submerged in the ink in the waste bottle. It can cause a siphon effect that can cause the contamination. Did the contamination come back right away after you changed those parts or did it take a while to come back?
 

gixxer2004

New Member
I checked the tubes and they were not submerged. It was contaminated before changing all of the parts and after I changed everything. I just printed a 4'x8' and the nozzle check has the same contamination. All of the dampers are filled half way up the circle...would that cause the problem? What if I did a cartridge fill? I had entire bars of colors dropped before and it was fixed with a cartridge fill.
 

Solventinkjet

DIY Printer Fixing Guide
The circle part of the dampers should be half full. Running a simple cleaning cycle should get rid of the contamination. If it doesn't get any better after a cleaning usually it's a bad damper, cap top, or pump. Take a look at the bottom of the head. Does it look really dirty or have any ink where the nozzles are? I am thinking that maybe your wiper is dirty, or bloated so it is leaving ink on the bottom of the head. Also get a flash light and check that when the head is in the home position, the cap is lining up properly with the bottom of the head.
 

SightLine

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My understanding, and I could be wrong, but I'm quite confident that on a JV33/CJV/JV5 that the dampers should be completely full. I want to think I saw it in some Mimaki document or maybe a video Mimaki has for changing the printhead (could have been for any of the DX5 head models - don't remember) where they state and show opening the valves in the service menu, then install the new damper on the line, hold it upside down, then gently press in the side valve on the damper until ink just starts to leak out trying to make sure that no air remains in the dampers. The older style DX4 dampers should be half full but on the DX5 head machines they need to be full. Vander is def an expert on these so take any tips he might have for sure.

I have run into this on ours before but cannot remember what the problem was.
 

InstantOneMedia

New Member
We just had an issue with our 6 month old Mimaki JV33 print head not dropping black correctly. We switched to triangle about 1 month in, and started having issues around month 6. Since we had the warranty switched over to triangle, we turned to them for the solution which was a new print head. They wouldn't pay for the new print head until they could inspect it and the ink to see where the issue was. Then 2 weeks later we had the same issue with the new print head. So we switched back to Mimaki ink and that fixed the problem.

Just heard today that they found fibers in the original print head. We only use the swabs to clean the head, so I can only guess the fibers came from the ink.

Have you tried using mimaki inks again?
 

gixxer2004

New Member
I think I might have a bad cap top or the head is going bad. I inspected it closely and it looks like the one corner might be slightly lower than the others. I just replaced it probably a month ago.

Robert-
I have think I purchased the pump off of you a few years back for my mutoh falcon but never installed it. It does have the clear tubes.
 

jwalknet

New Member
Maybe Capping Station Alignment

I was having black ink being drawn up into my yellow as well. My tech brought in a Mimaki supplied jig that lined up the capping station properly and the problem went away. He said it was from air entering the capping station because of misalignment. He also said you could line up the capping station manually by running a small bead of ink around the top of the capping station and then let the print head seat and then seeing that the ink lines left on the print head are properly positioned. Hope this helps.
 
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