Roland SC500 cant print full banner

[izanchor]

Just bought used Roland SC500. Replaced Capping station, Pump, heads, dumpers. When printing small stickers its ok, But when you print big banner sign. Color Change 1/3 way, looks like black or other color is missing.
Any Suggestion would be very appreciated.
Running: Colorchoice 4.5 & Flexisign 8.6 both doing the same problem.

 

[Stormyj]

Can you submit a pic of what its doing. Might help and more people will respond.

 

[DRamm76]

Did you get any kind of service report from the person you purchased it from? That's a lot of replacements to do on used machine you just purchased.

 

[izanchor]

Thank you for all the views and suggestions. Bought it with clog heads, so replace it myself with the rest of the capping station, pump, dampers. Is it not because my cable to long. Had 6ft parallel cable from printer then another 6ft of parallel to USB connection. Setup as USB01printer. Also bought used XP desktop for Colorchoice only run on XP.
See photo of print with missing color after 12"-20" of print. Tried printing again but it happen on different spot. Not consistent on the same distance it varies. Memory maybe or any help would be appreciated.

 

[J Hill Designs]

I would do a print of 4 36" long boxes, 100% C, M, Y, K respectively. turn color correction off, and print it. see if only 1 or 2 colors start degrading at the magic 12-20" mark. if so, you have flowthrough issues on those colors. if they all stop/die it could still be flow issues, but it also could be the fact that you are daisy-chaining cables.

if you can, try pulling the machine closer to use just 1 cable and see if that works first.

 

[Solventinkjet]

Usually when memory is damaged or failing the print will just stop completely. In this case I would say you have a plumbing issue. I would double check your ink lines for any air that may be sneaking in and also check that when you run a cleaning, ink actually flows through your waste tubes. It looks like you revived the machine pretty well. You might just need a new oring for the black and/or have a defective damper.

 

[izanchor]

Thanks 3hill & vander2 for quick reply. I can move cable closer but don't have parallel port on my computer. I'll try printing it out with box and see on which color is not working. I change dampers but didn't change the oring.. I'll try to tighten up a bit more on hose connecting to damper and see if it helps. Did cleaning and see waste good ink coming out from pump.
Ill try again later tonight and will let you know. Tnx

 

[izanchor]

Also one more thing forgot to mention. LH side Printhead I didnt change the Head Rank for its combination of Letter and number. Bought used working printhead, the RH side I manage to change rank ID for its all number. Just the LH which are my black, cyan and magenta are. What do you think this might be the problem. If so do somebody know how to convert letters to actual head number. Thanks

Also when I do Service mode Solid Test print CMYK looks ok. Its just when I print big size photo banner.

 

[izanchor]

I tighten the damper connection and did 4x cleaning. I can see ink coming out from pump no problem. Did the test and still doing the same thing. Swap dampers and still the same. Tried printing CMYK in blocks and it shows that the complete head 1 stop printing (black, cyan, magenta).
What do you think is my carriage board need to be replaced? or its something else. Please need help. thank you

 

[J Hill Designs]

its not electrical. its 'plumbing' related.

new captop perhaps

 

[izanchor]

Thanks J Hill,
I actually watch the printer until print head 1 stop injecting ink. It didn't go to the capping station to do quick clean. But it just normal print but head 1 stops working. Once it started the problem cancel printing and see if there's ink on the damper and if i see visible air bubble on line. But no sign on Air leak. What do you mean captop? just replaced the capping station.

 

[J Hill Designs]

take a photo of the cmyk blocks print

 

[izanchor]

This is what shows on my printout (K,C,M,Lc,Lm,Y)
print ok until few inches and notice black, magenta & light magenta change color. Is this main board problem or carriage board? Help would be very appreciated.

 

[techsign33]

To isolate the problem were it is in machine or pc do the next.

From service menu :
test pattern > fill pattern (enter) will print full width each color alone .

 

[izanchor]

Thanks, I did the service fill test print already and it didn't show any color change. For it only print 1.5" horizontal strip per color. What I did now as per 3hill suggestion to make a blocks solid color and see what color missing. At first I thought that it stops firing until I see the block printout. It did not show miss firing but it change color from black to light yellow and magenta and Light magenta to CYAN. I'm hoping it's just the carriage board for its cheaper than Main board. Any thoughts of what the problem with the machine. Tnx

 

[techsign33]

Thanks, I did the service fill test print already and it didn't show any color change.

Did you mean it's print correct color or the same on last pic you post it.

 

[izanchor]

Full patter Test Print on service mode print fine. It only change color when you print bigger scale drawing or file.

 

[techsign33]

If pattern test print fine the printer electrically mechanically must be fine last thing to do check the black cartridge set it full ink and shake it,check the o ring above the damper the level ink in damper must be at least half the damper.

Next photo I pick it form thread here , the left mark piece have 2 tube each one connect to one cap , front this piece there is 2 holes when the carriage parking for cleaning it's move to the next mark part with 2 spring pushing well to close the 2 holes prevent air leaking so the pump drawing ink well .check that part for any thing wrong or broken , you can pull the 2 tube from left mark piece insert thing inside it to prevent leaking totally don't remove it from the cap.








if you have anti virus running or spyware any protected software turn it off while rip and print you can print uni direction lowering the data transfer , check the cable if you can set it just lpt then from bios set the parallel epp/ecp this lpt really cause some trouble in printing when it's too length or wrong setting from bios, if your pc haven't lpt port try change the cable at least with good shield one.

 

[izanchor]

one more thing I notice when it do the head cleaning. There's lots of ink on the wiper, so have to wipe it all the time when do the cleaning. is this normal? I see the both drain tube has ink coming down from the pump. So the capping station and pump works fine. Also note both are brand new installed. Is it not my capping station need to be aligned and needs adjustment. or just my cable for right now i have parallel to usb connection both lines are 6ft long/each.