Mimaki wiper seemes to be stuck

[gabagoo]

I gave my machine the usual Friday night nozel wash and a good cleaning. Jv130spII BTW .... I came in saturday morning (very rare for me) and I start the machine up and I hear this weird noise when the wiper is supposed to be wiping the heads. Sounds like a little muffled grinding sound, I peered underneath and it seems like the wiper is stuck and won't slide out. I then proceeded to get in there and give it a look. When I open the carriage the wiper came down and it was a bit messy in there which is weird as I just cleaned everything last night. I cleaned the wiper thouroghly and I wipe down the two steel rods that carry the wiper and everywhere that ink can gum up. I do see down the right side towards the back there is a metal piece that juts out a bit and it is absolutely black with ink although I have cleaned there before I don't think it is anywhere close to a point that could stop the wiper from moving. I cleaned it anyways and under the cover at the back in front of the sponge. I have never replaced the sponge and I have had the machine coming up to 2 years now. I even clean off the top of the black nylon or rubberbelt. I wonder what else it could be as the wiper came down when I opened the carriage yet seemed to be stuck when wiping the heads. Any Ideas?

 

[Letterbox Mike]

I had something similar to that happening to us for a while, but we got an error when it happened too. We tried to clean it and fix it ourselves but it didn't work, we eventually had to have a tech come out and they disasseblmed the entire wiper assembly, soaked everything in cleaning fluid, cleaned really well (to like new condition) and reassembled and it worked fine. I'm guessing there must be some ink buildup somewhere in there that you can't see or get to that's causing the problem, so if you're brave I'd start disassembling it and start cleaning. Wear old clothes, an apron and gloves, I remember that tech was covered in ink when he was done.

 

[JERHEMI]

It's ink that builds up on the two rods and when the wiper tries to slide over them it doesn't allow it to happen smoothly and has sort of a grinding sound. Every once in a while when the machine is off I slide out the wiper and clean the rods with a long swab with cleaning solution on it while carefully moving the wiper back and forth so the cleaning solution gets in there. Then when I'm finished I put a drop of oil on the rods then it seems to work fine! I've attempted to take the front cover off the machine with the hopes that the wiper assembly would be easy enough to take apart to clean well but its not so what I'm doing seems be working well enough so I'll just stick with it!

 

[thewood]

If the wiper encounters any resistance on the rails, it will stop moving and give you a "WIPER ERROR". I had a similar problem as insignia. I suggest doing a thorough cleaning of the wiper assembly, rails, wiper hood, etc.

 

[gabagoo]

I had no error, but since printing in thick mode it gets incredibly messy in there. I do clean the wiper and the capping station every night and I do wipe the rods with cleaning solution on a lint free cloth, however it is hard to clean the underside of the rods and maybe thats where the build up is occurring. I will try using a thin piece of cleaning cloth cut into a thin strip and soak it then use the old towel methos for drying your backside on it if I can get in that tight. Strangely enough though when I opened the carriage the wiper came out trouble free on its own. I keep a close eye on this as I am not sure how long the heads can go without a wipe

 

[particleman]

griding noise is the gears behind the wiper that have gotten ink build up on them. This is common on all 3 of our printers. There is a panel on the back of the printer that will make it very easy to scrape the build up of ink off the gears. It probably won't move because there is is link lodged in between the gears. You may need some force to break it loose again, but it should go, the whole wiper assembly/gear mesh is pretty simple how it works.

 

[gabagoo]

Thank you I will take a look from behind