Xc540 error

[Jim Hancock]

Clean the guide rails thoroughly with a clean cloth and alcohol. Then lightly lube the rails with white lithium grease. Move the cut carriage and the printhead carriage back and forth the entire length of the printer 8-10 time to distribute the grease into the bearings. Wipe any excess grease off the rails. I would rerun the aging step at this point. If this doesn't work, the only thing left is the servo board.

 

[bvaleri]

Well I feel real dumb now haha I didn't have any white lithium at the moment but used just a little bit of lube that I had for the rail on an old hp latex machine. Barely put any so I can clean it off and use white lithium when I get some but it let me setup roll. I'll grab some white lithium next time I'm at the hardware store and get it properly lubed up and hope all my issues are in the past. Much thanks to all that have assisted.

 

[Jim Hancock]

Nah, no reason to feel dumb. You can use a lightweight machine like 3in1. I prefer the lithium grease as it doesn't run and won't dry out like oil will. I would go ahead and clean the rail and use what you have for now and see if it fixes the issue. You can always redo it with lithium grease later if you want to.

 

[damonCA21]

Ah great news! glad we seem to have got there in the end. Hopefully once properly greased up it will keep working fine now. At least you do know that the other parts you bought are all working, and they would have failed at some point, so it's no bad thing to replace them early and you can keep the originals as spares for the future

 

[damonCA21]

Nah, no reason to feel dumb. You can use a lightweight machine like 3in1. I prefer the lithium grease as it doesn't run and won't dry out like oil will. I would go ahead and clean the rail and use what you have for now and see if it fixes the issue. You can always redo it with lithium grease later if you want to.

I like the spray lithium grease with the long straw, is great for getting into the bearing blocks and those awkward to get to bits.

 

[Jim Hancock]

I like the spray lithium grease with the long straw, is great for getting into the bearing blocks and those awkward to get to bits.

Yep! I actually use both, like damonCA21 said, the spray for the bearing blocks and tight spaces, but I prefer the grease for the rails, so I don't have overspray issue.

 

[bvaleri]

Well I got the white lithium coated up the rail and turned it on, service call. Put it in service mode ran aging to make sure the grease spread good across rail, let me set up roll. Turn it off and back on under normal mode, worked fine, try and set up roll service call.

 

[damonCA21]

Oh no what a pain! I think it may be a case of swapping boards now. If you buy one and it doesn't make a difference at least you can always sell it on again and get most of your money back

 

[bvaleri]

Possibly, not really sure what's up with it. I put it back in service mode and ran aging again. Let me setup roll and then I tried to send a print and see what would happen. It didn't warm up the heater like usual and immediately tried to print, and ran on the rail just fine but no ink was coming out.

Turned back off went to normal mode, started up fine and let me setup roll this time. Sent print and it actually heated but still didn't lay down any ink.

Edit: won't lay down ink on test print function either so not software related. Figured blown fuse but they all tested fine. All ink tubes are full can see ink on the heads when they leave caps but they aren't firing.

 

[bvaleri]

Found another post on here that had the same issue arise. Ended up being bad tr66 transistor. Luckily I have a spare head board that's not repairable (IC can't be sourced) I can snag that transistor from and test it out. Been meaning to teach my kid soldering anyway.

On the bright side I've also turned the machine on and off a bunch and setup roll without issue so must have just needed some extra runs to let the white lithium to distribute well.

 

[cornholio]

It's normal, that the heater is off by default in service mode. You can turn it on, if you want to.

 

[bvaleri]

Thanks for the info, I was unaware of that. Hopefully I'll get some time soon to repair the head board and my struggles will go away.

 

[Jim Hancock]

Found another post on here that had the same issue arise. Ended up being bad tr66 transistor. Luckily I have a spare head board that's not repairable (IC can't be sourced) I can snag that transistor from and test it out.

Excellent! FYI, the transistor is located next to the fuses, if you haven't located it yet. It going bad would certainly cause all the heads to stop firing - see attached circuit diagram. Definitely putting that one in my memory banks! Appears to readily available and under $10. Would you post a link to the post where you found this info, please?

 

[bvaleri]

I haven't pulled the head board back out but appreciate the diagram, much easier than digging through the service manual again.

Here is the link to that other post, I'll let you know if it turns out not to be the issue but I'm 99% certain. https://www.signs101.com/threads/xc-540-printing-blank.167937/

 

[bvaleri]

Back again after months (heads soaked), problem is still not solved. I replaced the transistor and then kept getting the previous 0110 error. Finally found that if I put the perfect amount of pressure on the carriage towards the material I can get it to set up roll. However the blank print issue remains even with the new transistor. Might have to try a different one, but it was new and should have fixed the blank print. Still no idea on the 0110 issue.

 

[damonCA21]

If your heads havent been used since november chances are they are clogged now and will need replacing

 

[bvaleri]

If your heads havent been used since november chances are they are clogged now and will need replacing

Even with the soak they would dry out and not fire at all? If so I'll probably just get rid of it not going to spend 5k on a new set of heads twice in a year.

 

[damonCA21]

Yes, you cant soak them for months. as the solvent inside the head will evaporate and clog the heads with the left over pigment

 

[bvaleri]

Yes, you cant soak them for months. as the solvent inside the head will evaporate and clog the heads with the left over pigment

Did not soak continuously for months but probably doesn't matter if nothing fired out the solvent. Welp, that sucks.

 

[damonCA21]

Did not soak continuously for months but probably doesn't matter if nothing fired out the solvent. Welp, that sucks.

The main point is that it didn't have any ink firing through the nozzles for all that time. To keep a head working it needs to be running so it always has fresh ink going through it, and it isn't just sitting in there. This is what clogs and kills them. Soaking can sometimes recover heads that have recently been running, i.e. within a few days, but not when it's been a long time