Oce/Fuji Roll to Roll Option - is it any good?

[F1225hgB42w]

Hello All -

We just upgraded our Acuity to a new Acuity X2 (double bed) and it should be installed in February or March. We have been considering adding the roll to roll media option (because where can you get a 84" wide roll to roll printer for under $30,000.00?), and it would act as our white ink printer - because we have to have white ink for our flatbed printer already, I would love to not have to stock ink for our Epson solvent printers (plus white the print quality is higher on the Epson, the opacity is no where near the UV/Acuity white ink). Does it work well? What can you print on it? Can you run scrim banner 13 and 18 oz? Can you run mesh banner with a release liner?

Is it worth the added costs? I we currently run our acuity most days about 6 or 8 hours, during busy times even more, but there are a few slow times where if we had the roll to roll option, I could run prints on the Acuity and keep it busy... It also acts as another back up option for our larger format printers (doesn't back up our 126" wide printers, but still covers up to 7' wide prints - IF it can print scrim/mesh well). Finally, can it print on fabric?

Thanks in advance for the input!

 

[Bly]

Our 360GT came with the RMO.
It's not as easy to load or as set-and-forget as our HP 360s so we really only use it for wider banners or white ink SAV jobs. Banner can get a slight tunnelling up of the media which causes a light mark occasionally. Not sure if that's the type of media or printer settings but it's not a real deal breaker.
It's also handy to leave a roll of cheap bond paper loaded for doing nozzle checks.
We haven't tried fabric but apparently there are some that will work ok so might test some out.

 

[SignMeUpGraphics]

Our 360GT also has white and RMO and we love it.
It can print entire rolls completely unattended, so you can leave it going overnight or do other jobs in the meantime.
It prints onto mesh with liner very well, we've been doing quite a bit of it lately.
We also print several thousand decals a month for one client, then run the job through our Roland or Graphtec to contour cut them all.
As Bly says, loading can be interesting but we don't find it too bad after doing it a couple of times. We haven't had any tunelling, so it may be media related.

 

[F1225hgB42w]

Our 360GT came with the RMO.
It's not as easy to load or as set-and-forget as our HP 360s so we really only use it for wider banners or white ink SAV jobs. Banner can get a slight tunnelling up of the media which causes a light mark occasionally. Not sure if that's the type of media or printer settings but it's not a real deal breaker.
It's also handy to leave a roll of cheap bond paper loaded for doing nozzle checks.
We haven't tried fabric but apparently there are some that will work ok so might test some out.

Our 360GT also has white and RMO and we love it.
It can print entire rolls completely unattended, so you can leave it going overnight or do other jobs in the meantime.
It prints onto mesh with liner very well, we've been doing quite a bit of it lately.
We also print several thousand decals a month for one client, then run the job through our Roland or Graphtec to contour cut them all.
As Bly says, loading can be interesting but we don't find it too bad after doing it a couple of times. We haven't had any tunelling, so it may be media related.

Hello -

Thank you both for your responses... It looks like the RMO is worth at least demoing, and possibly adding to our machine. Do either of you print wallpaper on the RMO?

Thanks!

 

[Bly]

Hello -

Thank you both for your responses... It looks like the RMO is worth at least demoing, and possibly adding to our machine. Do either of you print wallpaper on the RMO?

Thanks!

I haven't but am sure it would do a fine job.
The HP latexes are so easy and reliable I just run all that stuff on them.

How much extra is the RMO if you don't mind me asking?

 

[SignMeUpGraphics]

Do either of you print wallpaper on the RMO?

We've printed a lot on Phototex and it looks virtually identical to our eco-col machines, just 10x faster print time and less ink used.

 

[F1225hgB42w]

I haven't but am sure it would do a fine job.
The HP latexes are so easy and reliable I just run all that stuff on them.

How much extra is the RMO if you don't mind me asking?

Not sure, I may get it BEFORE the machine ships which makes it less expensive (I think it's 24,500 USD), or field upgrade (I think that is about $31,000.00). I have to find out and will let you know, but I'm buying a Fuji so it might be different for Fuji vs. Oce.

 

[F1225hgB42w]

We've printed a lot on Phototex and it looks virtually identical to our eco-col machines, just 10x faster print time and less ink used.

Thanks, we print more wall covering like Dreamscapes, Corographics, etc, but do print a little bit of phototex, we then liquid laminate it and it's bullet proof! I'll be setting up a time to demo to see how it runs with our material, but your information has been very helpful, thanks!

 

[SignMeUpGraphics]

Hearing that full rolls can be printed unattended is really good to hear!

Loaded up properly, the worst we ever see is a lateral variance of 1/8". Not too bad for a 150' run.

 

[Bly]

Loaded up properly, the worst we ever see is a lateral variance of 1/8". Not too bad for a 150' run.

How consistent are the panel lengths mate?
When printed at different times the lengths can be quite a bit off with the HP latexes.

 

[SignMeUpGraphics]

Sorry, not too sure about that. We have a client who will order ~3 full rolls of decals at a time, so we don't get to do long panel runs rather thousands of labels at a time.
We leave the accurate stuff for the Epson and the budget stuff for the Oce RMO.

 

[ProColorGraphics]

How consistent are the panel lengths mate?
When printed at different times the lengths can be quite a bit off with the HP latexes.

I have the Fuji LED1600 and it is awesome for wallpaper! I have run rolls of the Dreamscape and haven't heard any complaints from the installers. Even without a coating, it is way more durable than my Epson Surecolor.

 

[Pauly]

Love the RMO. I use to it run nozzle checks daily. although we dont do to much banners ect, when we do, i'll throw it on the RMO. only issue i've had was i didn't put enough tension on it once on a banner and the banner kept lifting and hitting the heads. lesson learnt there, and hasn't happened again.

You can do wallpaper on it, will need to be aired out, the UV ink will leave an odour for a few days.

 

[F1225hgB42w]

Love the RMO. I use to it run nozzle checks daily. although we dont do to much banners ect, when we do, i'll throw it on the RMO. only issue i've had was i didn't put enough tension on it once on a banner and the banner kept lifting and hitting the heads. lesson learnt there, and hasn't happened again.

You can do wallpaper on it, will need to be aired out, the UV ink will leave an odour for a few days.

Yes that's really good on a 150' run! Starting to think of more and more ways to justify adding the RMO. I can't count on our Rolands to pull off 50' runs without getting nervous about buckling/tracking.

I have the Fuji LED1600 and it is awesome for wallpaper! I have run rolls of the Dreamscape and haven't heard any complaints from the installers. Even without a coating, it is way more durable than my Epson Surecolor.

Sorry, not too sure about that. We have a client who will order ~3 full rolls of decals at a time, so we don't get to do long panel runs rather thousands of labels at a time.
We leave the accurate stuff for the Epson and the budget stuff for the Oce RMO.

How consistent are the panel lengths mate?
When printed at different times the lengths can be quite a bit off with the HP latexes.

Hello All, just got my quote back, it's coming in at $21,000.00 (so less than I expected). I'm going to go for it, I'll let everyone know how it ends up working out when it's installed in about 6 weeks. While I think it's crazy stupid that the machine only allows you to print up to 86.2″ (2.19 m) and they should have made it print up to the 99" table printable area, I still can't find any other printer deal that gets a 7 ft. wide printer with 6 channels plus two channels of white ink for only 21K.

Thanks for the feedback!

 

[SignMeUpGraphics]

Congrats. I'm sure you'll be plenty happy with what you'll be able to achieve with it.

 

[Pauly]

Hello All, just got my quote back, it's coming in at $21,000.00 (so less than I expected). I'm going to go for it, I'll let everyone know how it ends up working out when it's installed in about 6 weeks. While I think it's crazy stupid that the machine only allows you to print up to 86.2″ (2.19 m) and they should have made it print up to the 99" table printable area, I still can't find any other printer deal that gets a 7 ft. wide printer with 6 channels plus two channels of white ink for only 21K.

Thanks for the feedback!

You'll see why it cannot go wider.
It'll need a much wider gantry, then it'll stick out to far and will cause a 6.5 inch gap between the bed and gantry plate (unsure if the actual term) that protects the head from the open. That would cause many issues with nozzles. That would require the table to be even wider. or have 6.5 inch extension plates on the ends of the table.
Can of worms if you ask me.