UCJV330 - White ink waste

[dinomaskot]

I've noticed that during regular printing (not with white), my UCJV is using/wasting quite a lot of it compared to other colors. Is there anything i can to do make it better apart from adjusting my pricing?

 

[Smoke_Jaguar]

Because the UCJV330 uses circulation dampers for white, they seem to bleed a lot more than subtanks when idle, especially on circulation cycles. Not sure there's a way around it. Can check your capping station gap. Note that I did my first install on a UCJV330 just this past month, so I don't have a ton of experience on them.

Just looking at the capping station, it also appears much more prevalent on the screen because it's a thicker ink in general. Empty your waste tank and check on it in a couple of days. If it looks bright white, it might be an issue. If the ink is more of a milky freakish purple, that's pretty normal.

 

[dinomaskot]

Because the UCJV330 uses circulation dampers for white, they seem to bleed a lot more than subtanks when idle, especially on circulation cycles. Not sure there's a way around it. Can check your capping station gap. Note that I did my first install on a UCJV330 just this past month, so I don't have a ton of experience on them.

Just looking at the capping station, it also appears much more prevalent on the screen because it's a thicker ink in general. Empty your waste tank and check on it in a couple of days. If it looks bright white, it might be an issue. If the ink is more of a milky freakish purple, that's pretty normal.

Thank you for the reply! <3
I've had it for a bit more then a month and my white ink levels are at 28/33% from like 60% when installed, and I didn't print more than one square meter with white. So it doesn't seem right. Then again, its my first printer with white, so maybe it's normal.. dont know..

 

[Smoke_Jaguar]

Are you going off the screen/what the chips say, or off bottle weight/feel/looking inside? The chips are terrible on accuracy as they are basically just a counter.

 

[dinomaskot]

Off screen/rasterlink... but bottles feel even emptyer to be honest.. a week ago it said
M:56 C:53 Y:52 B:51 Cl:64/64 W:35/38 and now it's
M:53 C:49 Y:48 B:39 Cl:61/61 W:28/33
And i didn't do anything with white or clear, and quite a lot with CMYK..

 

[Smoke_Jaguar]

Yeah, looks pretty typical. White is one of those things that just loses a good bit in bleed-out. Not much you can do to change that unfortunately. Any time a cleaning or purge is done, all channels are pulled from, plus you have circulation losses and also a white ink circulation tank to fill. Once the system is filled, you don't take as much of a hit on white, so if this is your first set of inks, it'll average out in the long run.

 

[Philw]

I've noticed that during regular printing (not with white), my UCJV is using/wasting quite a lot of it compared to other colors. Is there anything i can to do make it better apart from adjusting my pricing?

So do you have the UCJV 300 or UCJV330 ? My understanding is that whereas the UCJV300 had Ricoh heads the UCJV330 has possibly Brother heads. My UCJV330 is just over 5 years old nbow and the white is the printer's strongest feature. If you're not printing much then the flushes and waste white ink are a major pain but the wastage appears top drop with higher usage, I'm assuming the flushes reduce in frequency when it's pumping a lot more ink. I've using LUS170 and white ink account for probably 60% plus of the printer's output these days. Interestingly the white nozzles have by far the best print quality and the least over spray, I pretty much always run in 600 x 600 24 pass mode. The wastage is a pain but much better than clogged nozzles.