New Printer Research

[Signed Out]

Looking to add/replace a printer to our shop. Currently we have a Roland XJ 540 6 color (xc without cutter). It's over 8 years old, has been good to us for the most part, and still running pretty strong. But it has been getting more finicky as time goes on. We have some large fleet wrap jobs coming up this summer and is a good time to add another printer. Will probably keep the XJ since trade in quote we got was only $2k...

A little about our business. About 60% of our sales is vehicle/equipment graphics/wraps/decals, about 20% is rigid signs, ACM/alum mostly, and the other 20% is yard signs/posters/mags/misc. We have a roland gx 500 plotter and RS 54" laminator. On average our printer runs about 4 hours per day. So print speed isn't our biggest need (although always appreciated) We prefer to get better colors, less banding, no graininess in our prints than to be blazing fast. One thing we don't like about our roland is how it prints grays and some banding in certain colors.

Ideally we would like to stick with Roland as our printer while not perfect, has not left us stranded. Also would be nice to keep the same RIP/workflow to ease transition and hopefully be able to easily reproduce graphics from old files. However, the new printer will be a 64" and eventually (or simultaneously) we will also add a new 64" plotter and laminator. And we have been wanting to upgrade our plotter as the roland really doesnt' track good on anything longer than 8'. So if we upgraded to say a Summa, we would need to run a different rip anyway, at that point sticking with roland because of the workflow doesn't really carry much weight.

So while it would be easy to stick with Roland, I don't think it's absolutely necessary. And we haven't seen many good reviews on the newer roland machine. The 2 we'd be interested in would be the EJ 640 and the rf 640. We do like the idea of the light black ink option to help with poor printing grays, and metallic ink would also be nice. No need really for white ink. We've also looked into some mimaki and epson printers. One thing that scares me is the epsons ink is rated for only 2 years outdoor unlaminated, where roland is 3 years.

Our needs in order of importance:
1. Printer reliability
2. Long lasting outdoor prints
3. Print quality: no banding or graininess, good grays
4. Printer speed
5. Low odor

Does anybody have any reviews of the EJ 640? Also would love to hear expierences/suggestions for other printers, especially the epsons and their outdoor ink life span.

 

[Signed Out]

After doing some more research, it seems the epsons have experienced short ink life mainly due to the orange and red ink. Some reviews suggest this has been addressed with the 80 series. Can anyone confirm if prints off an 80 series epson with O and R inks will last as long outdoors as roland eco sol max inks?

Can you configure an 80 series epson to be CMYK lc lm lk? We really don't need white or metallic ink. We do currently print on metallic silver vinyl to make metallic prints and works fine on our roland. Reviews on the metallic and white inks across all brands aren't very impressive.

Would prints off a dual cmyk 80 series epson look better than our 6 color roland xj 540? With the new printer upgrade, the biggest improvements we would like to see is prints with grays that are actually gray (not greenish or redish) and no banding.

 

[BigfishDM]

Looking to add/replace a printer to our shop. Currently we have a Roland XJ 540 6 color (xc without cutter). It's over 8 years old, has been good to us for the most part, and still running pretty strong. But it has been getting more finicky as time goes on. We have some large fleet wrap jobs coming up this summer and is a good time to add another printer. Will probably keep the XJ since trade in quote we got was only $2k...

A little about our business. About 60% of our sales is vehicle/equipment graphics/wraps/decals, about 20% is rigid signs, ACM/alum mostly, and the other 20% is yard signs/posters/mags/misc. We have a roland gx 500 plotter and RS 54" laminator. On average our printer runs about 4 hours per day. So print speed isn't our biggest need (although always appreciated) We prefer to get better colors, less banding, no graininess in our prints than to be blazing fast. One thing we don't like about our roland is how it prints grays and some banding in certain colors.

Ideally we would like to stick with Roland as our printer while not perfect, has not left us stranded. Also would be nice to keep the same RIP/workflow to ease transition and hopefully be able to easily reproduce graphics from old files. However, the new printer will be a 64" and eventually (or simultaneously) we will also add a new 64" plotter and laminator. And we have been wanting to upgrade our plotter as the roland really doesnt' track good on anything longer than 8'. So if we upgraded to say a Summa, we would need to run a different rip anyway, at that point sticking with roland because of the workflow doesn't really carry much weight.

So while it would be easy to stick with Roland, I don't think it's absolutely necessary. And we haven't seen many good reviews on the newer roland machine. The 2 we'd be interested in would be the EJ 640 and the rf 640. We do like the idea of the light black ink option to help with poor printing grays, and metallic ink would also be nice. No need really for white ink. We've also looked into some mimaki and epson printers. One thing that scares me is the epsons ink is rated for only 2 years outdoor unlaminated, where roland is 3 years.

Our needs in order of importance:
1. Printer reliability
2. Long lasting outdoor prints
3. Print quality: no banding or graininess, good grays
4. Printer speed
5. Low odor

Does anybody have any reviews of the EJ 640? Also would love to hear expierences/suggestions for other printers, especially the epsons and their outdoor ink life span.

Banding will go hand and hand with eco-solvent machines.

You will not get banding in Latex, highest print speeds since their is no outgassing, no odor, long lasting outdoors even without lam, very reliable, only graininess in a few pastel colors, and I can show you how to hit great grays. I know you are asking about other machines, but you really should check out a latex machine and see what you think.

 

[Signed Out]

Is it me or does nobody own an ej 640? Been searching threads for reviews and can't hardly find any.

As far as latex, we aren't really considering them. Same day lamination isn't a huge deal for us. Too many negatives with latex. 220, high heat, warping material, not ideal for short runs, less durable prints, lower quality prints, higher maintenance costs, throw away machines, no aftermarket, etc.

 

[unclebun]

I don't think no banding with latex is true. You should see my competitors' signs done on latex (though the ones that use old Rolands are even worse)

With the Epson, the red ink and orange ink still isn't listed as having the outdoor durability that the CMYKLcLm have. I use an S70670, and what I do is run a profile that doesn't use orange ink when I'm doing outdoor signs. For me, the results I get color-wise are almost the same as when I use the orange ink. Quite frankly, there is one type of job we do that I bought the Epson for because of the orange ink, and that's mainly what we use it for.

With the new Epsons, to get the light inks you have to get the S80600. I'd recommend the white ink rather than the metallic silver. We do have somewhat regular occasion to use white underlayer, but almost no reason for metallic silver.

You might be surprised at how good the dual CMYK S60600 is as far as color. I wonder if I'd have ever gotten the orange ink printer if I'd started with one of those rather than a Mimaki JV3.

Gray being gray has never been a problem with any profile I've run on the Epson, though I suspect that is often a function of the RIP and its settings more than anything else.

 

[FatCat]

If your primary business is wraps, I would advise to also look at the Mutoh 1624x - incredible machines for the money - we have 3 of them and do a lot of wraps. (Oh, and no banding either - that might have been true on older solvent machines but in my opinion a new solvent like the Epson or Mutoh output far better quality than comparable latex machines as long as you are using correct profiles and have your machine calibrated correctly.)

 

[BigfishDM]

Is it me or does nobody own an ej 640? Been searching threads for reviews and can't hardly find any.

As far as latex, we aren't really considering them. Same day lamination isn't a huge deal for us. Too many negatives with latex. 220, high heat, warping material, not ideal for short runs, less durable prints, lower quality prints, higher maintenance costs, throw away machines, no aftermarket, etc.

Less Durable? Less Quality? Higher Maintenance? Throw away machine? Those are truly false statements. I sell solvent, eco-solvent, UV, and Latex and the amount of maintenance vs. a latex is not even debatable to be honest. It does take 220 though, you are correct on that, and it is horrible for running pieces of scrap vinyl also.

You are looking for a UNICORN machine, but since those do not exist yet, Latex hit most of your requirements. It will be curious if anyone chimes in who actually runs one of those Rolands. Must not being doing that well if you cannot find any feedback on them.

 

[HulkSmash]

I will literally never purchase any other large format 60" printer unless its an Hp latex. I've had them all they all look down to that machine. I definitely would never touch a mutoh in my life ever again. I've heard only bad things about the newer rolands, and they're having a lot of problem with "Lemon" machines. If i had to look at something else other than the HP it would be the newer epsons.. but yeah.. HP L365s all day.

 

[CanuckSigns]

We run an Epson S80600 and have been absolutely thrilled with it for the last 16 months. This machine can hit colours that a latex machine can only dream of. The prints are dry enough to handle right off the machine, we usually wait to the next day to laminate due to our workflow, but the few times I've had to laminate right away ive had no issues.

The latex machines are more expensive to own with their replaceable print heads, there are 8 print heads in the machine, each cost around $150 and are rated for 2000ml each, so the average shop would be changing them out twice a year, so that's $2400 a year on print heads.

As for speed, have a look for yourself.

 

[BigfishDM]

We run an Epson S80600 and have been absolutely thrilled with it for the last 16 months. This machine can hit colours that a latex machine can only dream of. The prints are dry enough to handle right off the machine, we usually wait to the next day to laminate due to our workflow, but the few times I've had to laminate right away ive had no issues.

The latex machines are more expensive to own with their replaceable print heads, there are 8 print heads in the machine, each cost around $150 and are rated for 2000ml each, so the average shop would be changing them out twice a year, so that's $2400 a year on print heads.

As for speed, have a look for yourself.

Why do they run the Epson at 8 pass in the video, but 10 pass with the HP

 

[BigfishDM]

We run an Epson S80600 and have been absolutely thrilled with it for the last 16 months. This machine can hit colours that a latex machine can only dream of. The prints are dry enough to handle right off the machine, we usually wait to the next day to laminate due to our workflow, but the few times I've had to laminate right away ive had no issues.

The latex machines are more expensive to own with their replaceable print heads, there are 8 print heads in the machine, each cost around $150 and are rated for 2000ml each, so the average shop would be changing them out twice a year, so that's $2400 a year on print heads.

As for speed, have a look for yourself.

How much ink is wasted in the Epson? How often do you clean your platen? How long does that take, what do you pay that employee? They don't calculate that into the ink equation do they? With HP, your all in cost with heads and everything is about $0.19 per ml. Does Epson have a better ml cost that is accurate?

 

[iPrintStuff]

Why do they run the Epson at 8 pass in the video, but 10 pass with the HP

To fit their agenda, silly.

 

[Christian @ 2CT Media]

We run an Epson S80600 and have been absolutely thrilled with it for the last 16 months. This machine can hit colors that a latex machine can only dream of. The prints are dry enough to handle right off the machine, we usually wait to the next day to laminate due to our workflow, but the few times I've had to laminate right away I've had no issues.

The latex machines are more expensive to own with their replaceable print heads, there are 8 print heads in the machine, each cost around $150 and are rated for 2000ml each, so the average shop would be changing them out twice a year, so that's $2400 a year on print heads.

As for speed, have a look for yourself.

Total falsehood. We run our heads to at least 12k ml, sometimes as high as 20k ml. I always think these latex comparison videos are funny, why not show sellable to sellable on properly profiles machines on both fronts? We have our machines profiled to run 6pass for wraps and it will run at close to 400sqft/hr.

To the OP if speed is of no importance, material flexibility, and your biggest concern is a wide gamut look at the Epson SureColors. If most of your work is wraps for companies, the Latex is the best choice right now on the market there is even a new version coming soon from HP and another company that will be a major leap forward for the technology.

 

[Signed Out]

So many mixed reviews on latex printers. Mostly you see that the print quality is not on par with even old solvent printers like ours. Then you see some high volume shops that chime in and say, nah latex prints great... as long as it's profiled and calibrated correctly. With our roland, we never had to deal with profiling. I'm sure we could get some better quality and more performance out of it if we did (maybe fix our grays and minor occasional banding) Just another headache and learning curve I'd like to avoid if possible.

Really wish roland hadn't fallen off the face of the earth with their latest offerings. Would be so easy to just get the latest and greatest from them and have a seamless transition.

How well do the hp latex machines print say 2" hard hat stickers with small text?

 

[CanuckSigns]

How much ink is wasted in the Epson? How often do you clean your platen? How long does that take, what do you pay that employee? They don't calculate that into the ink equation do they? With HP, your all in cost with heads and everything is about $0.19 per ml. Does Epson have a better ml cost that is accurate?

I've wasted about 350ml of ink in 16 months, or around $100 worth
never cleaned the platen, on any of my eco-solvent machines, never had the need to.

 

[CanuckSigns]

Why do they run the Epson at 8 pass in the video, but 10 pass with the HP

Because the Epson at 8 pass is equal quality wise to the HP at 10 pass

 

[Christian @ 2CT Media]

So many mixed reviews on latex printers. Mostly you see that the print quality is not on par with even old solvent printers like ours. Then you see some high volume shops that chime in and say, nah latex prints great... as long as it's profiled and calibrated correctly. With our roland, we never had to deal with profiling. I'm sure we could get some better quality and more performance out of it if we did (maybe fix our grays and minor occasional banding) Just another headache and learning curve I'd like to avoid if possible.

Really wish roland hadn't fallen off the face of the earth with their latest offerings. Would be so easy to just get the latest and greatest from them and have a seamless transition.

How well do the hp latex machines print say 2" hard hat stickers with small text?

We print 10,000 1" circle decals a month for a client on our latex with small text about 8pt and they have never complained and constantly order.

I feel the biggest problem in our industry is ourselves, we set unreasonable standards that our clients don't often care about. Just had prime example the other day with a competitor/friend who sent a client to us for a job. They used to get frustrated about the colors they output and didn't have time for this client right now so we printed their signs on our normal 6pass profile. The client said our colors looked perfect to them. Moral is I feel we stress ourselves out over standards that the clients themselves don't require us to achieve.

 

[Christian @ 2CT Media]

Because the Epson at 8 pass is equal quality wise to the HP at 10 pass

But when profiled correctly the HP 6 Pass is on par with that 8 pass

This is 6 pass

 

[Signed Out]

But when profiled correctly the HP 6 Pass is on par with that 8 pass

This is 6 pass

Is that printed on matte vinyl?

 

[Christian @ 2CT Media]

Is that printed on matte vinyl?

Arlon 510MT, yes