Question what is very clean 540sc needing heads worth?

[mcbirdman]

I really appreciate members here. Learned SO much.

I know people don't have lot of time reading. Short. I have a vp540 that has the flaky apparently heat dependent connection. Board costs 1500.00. I still will be replacing heads

An acquaintance has a sc540 that is in great shape but has sat So long probably needs heads and tubing which I can do. He wants 3000 because he claims that is what he was offered by the company that I believe serviced his machine originally. From everything I have read here they normally and researched the going price would be 500-1000 if not working and 1000-2000 if needs heads. He was at 5000 and I believe they didn't neccesarily offer him 3k but probably told him much less and they said he'd be lucky if he even got 3k.

Should I just stick with the vp540 with 4 inks and invest the 1500 to fix problem or put it towards the 6 color but older that works on the slightly older ripcut? My gut feeling is that even though the printer very clean and pristine.... it only worth 1-2000, On the other hand it has the pressure rollers that I don't have and they are worth 100.00 a piece which would be about 600 worth.....

 

[woolly]

between the devil and the deep blue sea really,
i have had a sc540 pro2 from new and maintained it from warranty end and touch wood works perfectly still used every day, well setup and cared for delivers quality print and cut. dedicated parts are now not to be found but a lot of bits are on your vp heads etc. if i needed to replace this one i would like a pro3, i also have a vs540 and dislike the head system for maintenance but the print quality is one notch up in fine work. if i have a 8x4 to print then the sc is the choice.
i could only see it worth 3000 to 4000 if it was fully working just about 5000 if perfect in every way and a warranty from a dealer.
so cost up 6 heads 3 new type pumps + new fitting kit if still old type pumps, captops wipers etc.12 inks add a 1000 for your time and hassle then see how that feels, but have in mind things like feed and scan motors, the heater system was a add on after they first came out and the controller is no longer available although after a lot of looking around found a cheap replacement but not controlled by the motherboard. controls the temp well but manual switch on and off.

there are places that will service your vp motherboard would i trust that don't know with out a lot of searching

 

[mcbirdman]

Thanks Wooly, You see the Idillema and I appreciate the thoughts.... We are missing the media clamp rollers, only have two and they were cracked so I jb welded them. Not sure how many I should have but at 100.00 apiece , there are 500 .00 in parts I could use right away on the vp540....

This sc540 we are considering is brand new looking and clean, I just know that he put it away wet. He said the 3 pumps were new and the newer style. I doubt the heads or hoses are good, after seeing what the gutted vp540 looked like. I have read that the sc540 has a cable that is somewhat undesirable and that I can only run it on rippit or something software as opposed to the versacam software.

So that would be six heads @550, the dampers and hoses, and the time to bring an otherwise clean machine to life. I guess maybe you or others think given these costs that even a clean machine with bad heads is only worth about 1000.00-1500,00 MAX ? I just can't see how he was really offered 3000 by the roland repair techs...even clean..... Maybe they said a WORKING Machine was worth 3k. I mean I even saw a post on here where a guy wondered if he should pick one up for 200.00. He was asking what people thought and someone put a link to read background or about some issues but the link was bad and I have no idea what it said.

I am curious how the vp540 4 color setup prints better than the albiet older but 6 color system....... I am looking for quality and I figured the bonus would be that the 6 head sc540pro2 EX would have been better.

Just trying to be fair, but also have some opinions maybe I could share with him regarding how much is a fair price. I get it....He keeps saying he spent 20k and 500 for the stand etc..... But it is old and limited from age and parts......He has got to realize some of these things are not worth the rebuild prices if the machine price is too high......

 

[netsol]

for what it's worth i just paid $1500 for a sc545-ex with 2 bad heads & needing head board repair & maintenance parts less than a moonth ago

putting heads in this weekend

 

[netsol]

still haven't decided if i want to convert to bulk ink
not sure if i will get much better fade resistance with roland cartridges for much more $
there is a certain attraction to only needing to keep 6 liters of 3rd party ink.

 

[FrankW]

Be aware of that a SC-545 is at minimum 13 years old, and if you need a complete set of heads, this machine needs 6 (!) heads, 12 (!) dampers, 12 (!) new ink tubings, 12 (!) new ink cartridges, 6 (!) new Cap Tops, 3 (!) new pumps and so on.

And from your VP540, you will go one generation back, the SC-545 for example don't have the Roland Intelligent Pass-Functionality to reduce banding, no drying heater (if no third party heater is added), no possibility to drive the print heater temperature from software (you need to switch them on and off manually) and so on.

I have supported that printers for a long time and they really working well ... but for my opinion, I would only suggest to buy one specially in the described condition for a few hundred bucks if you have a chance to trade them in for a new one.