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What's wrong with my XC540?

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Desert_Signs

New Member
Prints fine. No banding, stair stepping, etc. Here's what happens.

A job prints, at the end, the carriage goes home and seems like it's going to seat at the cap station, then there's a little jerk and I get a scan motor error. Things I have tried so far with no effect: Limit initialization. Encoder calibration. Cleaned encoder strip. Didn't help. New encoder strip, didn't help. New scan motor. Didn't help. New belt and pulleys, didn't help. Loosened the belt, tightened the belt. Didn't help. These are all parts I had on hand, so I figured I'd just try stuff. :banghead:

Any ideas what this could be? It does the 'bang' thing at the end, throws the error, I power it off, back on, and it's fine again. I get either 0040 or 0050 errors.

Here's a video of what happens.

[video=youtube;Q97D4MdYyWg]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q97D4MdYyWg[/video]
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Stormyj

Stormyj

Just another guy
Watching that video it looks like when it reaches the lock position, it misses the lock. Other words, it comes into cap position, until it reaches the limit, then it should set the lock so when it returns to the left, it separates the magnet/cutter from the print head. However, it isnt separating and is causing the error. Check your cable attached to the cutter. Mine had a loose screw and when it moved back and forth along the print area, it would ever so slightly change its position, thus screwing up the limit initialization. Or perhaps the locking mechanism underneath the print head is not engaging. Good luck
 
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Desert_Signs

New Member
Stormyj said:
Watching that video it looks like when it reaches the lock position, it misses the lock. Other words, it comes into cap position, until it reaches the limit, then it should set the lock so when it returns to the left, it separates the magnet/cutter from the print head. However, it isnt separating and is causing the error. Check your cable attached to the cutter. Mine had a loose screw and when it moved back and forth along the print area, it would ever so slightly change its position, thus screwing up the limit initialization. Or perhaps the locking mechanism underneath the print head is not engaging. Good luck
Click to expand...

The carriage is actually locked. It's like the cut carriage is trying to jerk off the print carriage.

When you say cable, are you talking about the ribbon cable? If so, I took that off and reseated it just to be sure. That cable is fairly new (a month or so).
 
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Desert_Signs

New Member
Ahh, I see. But no, the XC540 doesn't have that. It uses a drive belt. The belt is secure to the cut carriage and I have tried looser than it's supposed to be as well as a little tighter...
 
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31legen

New Member
Roland

My old roland would do the same from time to time. The bracket that held the locking mechanism would move ever so slightly. Try and push that bracket down.
 
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Desert_Signs

New Member
UPDATE: SOLVED!

Turns out the linear encoder sensor on the back of the printhead carriage had come loose somehow. The screws weren't loose, but the little pin (see arrow in pic) wasn't seated properly in the hole on the mount. The sensor was sitting at an angle and was somehow causing the problem, probably messing up reading the encoder at the capping station end of the machine. Took it off and remounted it properly, been printing for 3 days with no errors!
 

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rjssigns

rjssigns

Active Member
Thanks for posting the fix.:thumb: It should be usable for many other models of Roland printers.(board looks exactly the same as my SP540V)

So many ask for help then disappear.
 
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Desert_Signs

New Member
rjssigns said:
Thanks for posting the fix.:thumb: It should be usable for many other models of Roland printers.(board looks exactly the same as my SP540V)

So many ask for help then disappear.
Click to expand...


Well, I wanted to update this thread again. The problem returned... I fought with it for 2 days trying to figure it out. It got so bad that I couldn't even do a test print without it crashing. It turns out, after all that, it WAS the belt. I put in what I thought was a new belt. It wasn't. It was an old one that came with the printer when I bought it. It had just been cleaned up really nice and looked new, was in the packaging, and I assumed it was new. I called the guy I bought the printer from and he said he had had a similar error a few years ago and replaced the belt and the problems went away. I told him "well, I put the new belt in that you included with the machine when I bought it and I'm having the same problem. It must be something else." He laughed and said "The belt you thought was new was the one that was causing me the same issue..."

Ooops.. So, now I have an actual new belt and things seems to be going OK. 100' printed so far today and no errors. I guess the teeth on the belt were worn just enough to slip on the pulleys and cause the encoder in the motor to disagree with the encoder on the print head carriage and screw everything up.
 
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Desert_Signs

New Member
stickercuttingcom said:
How difficult was it to install the new belt? Need any special tools or just the service manual?
Click to expand...


Very easy. You need a screwdriver and an allen wrench. It took the most time getting the new belt to track straight. On the pulleys there are 2 adjuster screws that let you angle the pulley. A tiny adjustment goes a long way.

The only special tool that the manual calls for is a tension gauge to measure how tight the belt is. I don't have one, so I got it til it felt right. My tech is coming by today to do some other stuff and I'm going to have him check it to see how close I got.
 
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Desert_Signs

New Member
Well..... Sh&**$. The issue is back. Except for this time it's not banging off the right end of the machine, it's just not going home all the way. It gets about 2 inches before lock and throws either a 0102 or 0105. I'm not sure how either code makes sense.

0102: The Head Lock Sensor may be malfunctioning or a bit loose.

0105: Machine fails to connect the Tool Carriage to the Head Carriage

First, for the 0102, it's no where near the head lock when it throws the code.

Second, for the 0105, the tool carriage IS connected when it throws the code.

I've done several limit initialization, no problem. Cleaned encoder strip and ran scan motor aging for 10 minutes. Just fine. Yet, as soon as a print finishes, I get this code. I even get it when it's printing "white space". IE, it knows there's no ink going down, so the head goes over to cap while it's feeding blank media. Error... I'm having to put a border around every single print so this doesn't happen. I just can't imagine it's the belt that's only 4 months old. I don't print THAT much...

However, we did just move into a new shop. Is there something I could have messed up when moving the printer? We were very very careful, but....

Ideas?
 
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