first things first.head adj pattern 2 is done first.this is to physically align printeads.front to back and slant.head adj pattern #2 requires a jig.one might be able to do it without jig but it would be very difficult.head adj #1 will be performed last.this is a printed pattern that you examine and enter values- that you have read from pattern- back into machine.these values are close but sometimes a little manual tweaking is necessary.If you dont know what u are doing u really should call for a tech.u should still be under warranty arent u?
i just did the head adj. 2 and you have to have two things before you can complete it. A blue led light to read the yellow line...otherwise forget it. This should be sold with the machine, but who ever thought we would have to do this much tweeking to begin with. Second... get a magnifying glass. YOu will need it for the fine lines to read them. We had two different people look the printout over and came up with two different adjustment input values. This is really better left to a tech... but they prefer we do it. I just read about a situation called severe tonal quantization. This has the look of color banding but is actually corrected with curves adjustment in your rip. I am looking into this because this is my biggest problem I have with this printer.
First of all, I wish everybody would include info on what rip they are using (we run Onyx 6) and on what media they are running and what kind of file they are trying to print. All these factors are important to diagnosing problems in the final print.
When you load media in the printer after it asks if you have loaded a roll or sheet, it asks what media. The machine came with a number of built-in media descriptions. You can pick anyone you want. The machine does not care what you call what is in the machine. The description you choose will tell the printer what the feed adjustment is and will also set the three temperatures. The machine will now figure out if you have loaded the media correctly and what width the material is. The other set of data the machine needs to print is the image file itself.
This file has been processed by the RIP software ( Onyx 6 in our case). The specific file description or pofile, was created by the media manufacturer, printer manufacturer, or some third party. We use all profiles provided through Onyx ( by the way, Onyx has really great tech. support!). Remember, the printer does not care what the media is or what you call name the profile has. You can set any media selection on the printer with any media in the machineand rip the file with any profile you want. As you can imagine there are many combinations of media, printer descriptions and rip profiles you can use. The trick is to experiment with a few combinations.
I hope this sheds some light for new users. I will continue later today with some combinations we use that give us great results.
I'm back. Here is one combination that works quite well for us:
Printer- choose "Banner" when asked for media. This is what we use for all scrim vinyl materials. Set print head in the high position. For printing on our media (16oz scrim vinyl, gloss) we set the temperature back to about 115 degrees F. until the printer starts to print. We have had some wrinkle problems with a lot of media if the temps are too high. Once printing you can inch up the temps to help drying. We rip files for this media using the "Avery 15oz banner" or "Avery Jupiter 13oz" The 13oz gives 4 pass printing and the 15oz profile is 8 pass. I am not real sure of these names because I am not in the office. The 13 oz profile does create some banding on the our 16 oz vinyl, however it looks fine on the large banners at a reasonable viewing distance. The 15oz profile printed a 2' X 5' color test print that is incredible. Absolutely beautiful, no banding, and it held the finest graduated screen tints down to about 5% in all colors.
The point of all this is you need to use the combination that works. Trial and error works well here. For Gloss photo paper (for posters, I think ours is about .008") We set the print head low and choose "BLT_P" as the media. You MUST turn the temps down as soon as the printer goes into preheating. 103 degress is plenty. Paper does not need much heat. We use a few different rip profiles for various papers but the 3M ControlTac profile works great or try Avery 1005 EZ glossy.
The head adjustment #2 you should leave to the service since you would need a special precision tool to adjust the head fisically in hight and slant angle. Since we are talking true 720 dpi we are talking micro millimeter adjustments which to perform without that reference tools will be guesswork at best. And once adjusted correctly they cannot change without interference. Head Adjustment #2 needs only to be done when replacing a print head.
Head Adjust Pattern #1 provides the user with features to be adjusted in reference to bi-directional adjustment, horizontal color misalignment to each other and such issues. This you can correct in your material or mechanical profile on the machine (the one you are asked to select when mounting material).
This adjustment (#1) also has effect on material thickness because the mentioned values depend largely on the distance between the head and the substrate you are printing on. If that distance varies, so vary the ballistics of the ink drops and that....is an issue.
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CompuNetConsult de Venezuela
Ing Helmut Hufenbach
helmut@cnc-ve.net
