New printer advice

[The Sign Depot LLC]

Hello everyone, we're looking to replace aging or problematic roll-to-roll printers and I'm looking for advice on simply what is the best. We run ONYX and build our own profiles. Our roll-to-roll work consists primarily of contour cut graphics, banners and wraps.

We are currently running an HP Latex 570 and a Roland XC-540 in addition to an HP R1000 and HP FB500. We love the instant lamination and cut the of the Latex 570 but it's color consistency is abysmal. With heads and ink in warranty, and utilizing all the tricks like gutters and rotating every other panel, we have pretty significant color shift over 10-20ft. We love the Roland reliability, but outgas times are an inconvenience.

What do you guys run and love? What do you hate? Help me find the best and avoid headaches. Thanks.

 

[White Haus]

We've been happy with our Epson S60600. Doing lots of volume? Get a S60600L. Doing TONS of volume? Get a Colorado.

We've had Roland XC-540 and XR-640 and much prefer the Epson.

No printer will 100% match all your requirements, you'll have to figure out what your product mix is between decals/banners/wraps, and which manufacturer can offer the best solution and support.

Most new printers will probably beat the HP Latex printers in terms of color consistency, but you'll lose some points for off-gassing.

 

[BigNate]

... the 700 and 800 HPs have better color consistency that the older latex - something to do with the better/longer curing area. Keep heads fresh and calibrate often. And these still have the benefit of no off-gassing - straight to laminating.

 

[d fleming]

Epson. Bought my first and last roland two years ago just to have a small printer in the shop for minimal orders and specialty work, like my own labeling needs. Good machine, worthless warranty and service.

 

[The Sign Depot LLC]

We've been happy with our Epson S60600. Doing lots of volume? Get a S60600L. Doing TONS of volume? Get a Colorado.

We've had Roland XC-540 and XR-640 and much prefer the Epson.

No printer will 100% match all your requirements, you'll have to figure out what your product mix is between decals/banners/wraps, and which manufacturer can offer the best solution and support.

Most new printers will probably beat the HP Latex printers in terms of color consistency, but you'll lose some points for off-gassing.

Thanks for the info. Other than being grossly outdated, our XC540 has been a great machine, hence the reason we've kept it so long.

Can you elaborate on what you like better about the Epsons?

Our volume is usually lots of small loads, like 10-20ft, then change out to different media and run another 10-20ft.

 

[The Sign Depot LLC]

Epson. Bought my first and last roland two years ago just to have a small printer in the shop for minimal orders and specialty work, like my own labeling needs. Good machine, worthless warranty and service.

Do you have an Epson now or just really unhappy with your Roland? Which Roland did you have?

 

[White Haus]

Thanks for the info. Other than being grossly outdated, our XC540 has been a great machine, hence the reason we've kept it so long.

Can you elaborate on what you like better about the Epsons?

Our volume is usually lots of small loads, like 10-20ft, then change out to different media and run another 10-20ft.

I know how you feel, we did enjoy our time with team Roland but I won't be going back. Roland helped us through our first 10 years of large format printing but as far as I'm concerned they've lost their way and don't have a place in our shop any more.

The Epson is MUCH faster than the Roland Soljets we ran before. Colors are good considering it's only a 4 color and our Rolands were 6-8 colors.

Tracking on the Epson is a million times better than the Rolands - we always had issues with poor tracking that would eventually result in head strikes. No such issues whatsoever with the Epson so far.
We print full rolls in 4ish hours, the Rolands would be a 8+ hour day to even come close to that.

Color consistency has been great, along with consistent quality over long runs of solid colors.

Loading/unloading media is also a huge improvement over Rolands, I really like the way they designed media handling on these things. You can also save all your media presets on the machine, so you load your new roll, tell it what you put on it, and boom you're ready to print within a couple of minutes. Makes roll changeover pretty quick and easy.

 

[chester215]

My limited experience with printers has been Mutoh Rockhopper>>>>>> HP Latex>>>>>>> Epson S40600 >>>>>> 2nd Epson S40600.

By far the Epson has been the best, with printing technology seemingly getting better and better I prefer the Epson.
Great color consistency and depth, Roughly as fast as the HP and hopefully will continue to be an easy printer to run.
Although I did like the HP Latex and would still be printing with it today, it was obsolete before it was ready to be
retired.

 

[greysquirrel]

Outgassing times unless over saturating your media is a marketing ploy. Epson surecolor laminated right away…never an issue

 

[StratoJet]

Well, it’s -10F here this morning and I’m not going outside; here’s just some general data and opinions…

Most 50-66” roll to roll printers are very similar and tend to differ mainly by ink types or Ink systems. Some companies newer inks that are used (some still under developed), were made to control what you put in their printer you bought from them. In most cases, this is a good thing, as this allows a more consistent and reliable product. It also gives you the ability to deal with a single brand when having issues. You might use or look into third party inks, but be careful, you’re loosing sight of the dollars counting pennies. Some third party inks can and will, slowly over months, degrade your printer internals much faster or can even cause catastrophic failure.

Gather good info from the manufacturer, not from a reseller or here, on the head life cycle. Depending on the ink types, flow, chemical makeup, the duration will vary greatly (don’t forget to calculate this cost into your sq/ft cost).

Printers love to be printing 24/7 (if built well) and tend to be more consistent. Printers do not do well just being used here and there (print a poster or something) every day as to avoid spending your time on the phone with tech support or waiting for them to come fix it. Spend your time talking to new or current customers to keep the printer: printing!

Ink comparison

Types of ink: Solent, Gel, Resin, Latex, UV, Aqueous and Synthetic
Best Color: Aqueous, Solvent, Synthetic
Least Filler colors needed (more than CMYK): Synthetic
Most versatile for media: UV, Synthetic
Least amount of stretch: UV
Lowest Sq/Ft cost: Synthetic (~$0.09 compared to ~Latex $0.26… )
Longest lasting print head: Aqueous, Synthetic
Shortest lifespan on print heads: Gel, Resin
Most post print reliability: Solvent, UV, Synthetic
Lowest VOCs: Synthetic (0% voc)

All inks need some time to change from a liquid to a solid. There will ALWAYS be degassing/evaporation; even after the built in printer drying process. Some VOCs will chemically interfere or react to a post handling process (touching, laminating, cutting, wrapping, certain medias…).

There is no one size fits all solution but you can certainly buy the best printer that fits your needs in your business. Look what’s most important by reviewing your print history and what makes up 80% of your profits. Keep at least one current printer online until you’ve worked out the details of the new printer and/or its tech.

Everything varies and there are a lot of different experiences, options and opinions, this is just a general starting point…

Happy Printing

 

[jharler]

Outgassing times unless over saturating your media is a marketing ploy. Epson surecolor laminated right away…never an issue

Can you explain how it helps the manufacturers to suggest for us to wait 6-24 hours after printing before laminating? The times listed may be on the safe side, but it seems like it would be better for their business to advertise less or no outgassing than to promote more if there was no need for it.

To the OP, I've been running an Epson s80600 for about 18 months now and I'm extremely happy with it. It's very low maintenance, it's fast (unless you're printing white) and the colors are phenomenal. I'm not an extremely high volume shop and I mainly print stickers, so take that for what it's worth. I also recently got a Mimaki UCJV330. The UV ink is a different beast altogether. It has its place, but I would honestly choose the s80600 over it for stickers. I haven't ran any banner material or done wraps on it, so I can't comment on that from personal experience.

 

[d fleming]

Do you have an Epson now or just really unhappy with your Roland? Which Roland did you have?

Last printer was an epson photopainter full solvent 64" roll to roll. I purchased a bn20 just to do labels. Next one, (of any size, if I buy another) will be another epson. Anytime it had trouble it got fixed under warranty. Roland billed me under warranty to fix a motherboard on a less than year old machine. Pretty sure I'm gonna fade into the sunset making rum though

 

[Bxtr]

We had two Epson 60600s, great workhorses with minimal issues. After 5-6 years we had the same thing go out on both... some $2k sensor.
We replaced those with the bulk 80600, we haven't had any other issues to speak of. The color gamut on the 80600 is phenomenal.

 

[MarkSnelling]

If you are printing more than 5 rolls of media a week, you should consider one of the Colorado printers. The best in terms of color consistency in the market, inexpensive inks, and despite I think it is an old wives tale about outgassing, you can instantly laminate. But it would only make sense if you are going through 20+ rolls of media a week as the printer is 2X of anything listed above (if not more). Figure your inks to be around $.08/ft2 and speeds around 400/ft2 (cast around 200/ft2).

 

[petepaz]

another important factor is tech and supply support. make sure whichever printer you go with you have adequate tech/repair support and easy access to supplies.
you can have the greatest printer in the world but if you run out of ink or the machine goes down then you aren't making money

 

[MarkSnelling]

another important factor is tech and supply support. make sure whichever printer you go with you have adequate tech/repair support and easy access to supplies.
you can have the greatest printer in the world but if you run out of ink or the machine goes down then you aren't making money

Furthermore, don't always assume that buying directly will get you better support. I'd say most times the dealer tech knows far more about the printer and applications associated with the printer than the break-fix guy from the manufacturer.