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I am printing on a Mutoh STS 628D printer. Printed this job last week, and it came out perfect.  This week, the blacks and dark colors are not laying down solid. You can see the cracking appearance before the film goes through the dryer.

The only thing that is different to my recollection is a new roll of film.  Has anyone ever seen this before?

20220919_121726_resized.jpg

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1 hour ago, carlathebluegeckoprinting. said:

I am printing on a Mutoh STS 628D printer. Printed this job last week, and it came out perfect.  This week, the blacks and dark colors are not laying down solid. You can see the cracking appearance before the film goes through the dryer.

The only thing that is different to my recollection is a new roll of film.  Has anyone ever seen this before?

20220919_121726_resized.jpg

Looks like slight banding in the prints aside from the cracked look, maybe a few clogged cyan nozzles being most prominent in the green. 

 

I have had this happen before, But it was my ink/film combination. Ever since using DTFSuperstore I haven't had this issue so it's been awhile. Likely overloading the film with ink in those spots. It's also why I buy everything in bulk, so I can get the settings for that " batch" in place and forget about it for awhile. 

 

Are you using the same film supplier and type as before? 

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Thank you for your reply.

I am getting all my supplies from All American Print since they supplied our equipment. Inks are STS 1 litre bulk packs.  None are expired.

I get the film from All American, they were out of our regular brand so I upgraded to the Ecofreen.  I am suspecting this might be the issue.

This morning I reduced the white under from 80% to 65% - the crackling remained. But I had my designer check out the file and the black areas are 100% K. I am now running tests with less black to see if that helps.

The slight banding is because we printed on medium quality mode - 720X720 bidirectional for speed. If I go higher quality the banding leaves.

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35 minutes ago, carlathebluegeckoprinting. said:

Thank you for your reply.

I am getting all my supplies from All American Print since they supplied our equipment. Inks are STS 1 litre bulk packs.  None are expired.

I get the film from All American, they were out of our regular brand so I upgraded to the Ecofreen.  I am suspecting this might be the issue.

This morning I reduced the white under from 80% to 65% - the crackling remained. But I had my designer check out the file and the black areas are 100% K. I am now running tests with less black to see if that helps.

The slight banding is because we printed on medium quality mode - 720X720 bidirectional for speed. If I go higher quality the banding leaves.

No worries at all.

 

Makes sense. Have you tried printing a composite black instead of just K? It looks like the grays are doing fine which is usually from a composite.

 

It sounds like something just isn't working right together. I know when I switch films I have a hell of a time trying to get everything adjusted to " perfection" again. Hot peel is what usually gives me the problems for some reason. I tend to gravitate toward the " hybrid" film that is hot or cold peel to stay close to what my settings are. Otherwise I end up flooding the film and running into various issues. On the flip side, Cold peel requires more ink so I stay away from that as well. 

 

As for the resolution, makes total sense. I know running dx7 heads I would run into good nozzle checks but poor ink flow in prints, mainly with cyan, sometimes with magenta. Figured I'd mention it. 

 

Happy printing!

 

 

 

 

 

Edited by johnson4
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1 hour ago, carlathebluegeckoprinting. said:

I checked our supplies, and somehow we got the hot peel, not the cold peel film.  Any ideas on that?

And the first set of prints we did at various percents of K, next will be composite black. Since no other color does this, and solid white lays on beautifully, I suspect it has to do with the blacks.

That was mainly my issues with hot peel as well. I assumed it was just me, who knows though. I've been printing for 2 years now so back then I always thought the issue was me, haha.  That and the transfers fall off the film easier than I would like when handling them but again, likely just me. People seem to love hot peel. 

 

Usually cold peel has more " pretreatment" so it handles more ink, could be the difference. Honestly I'd personally go back to the film I was using if possible and see if the issue persists, if not, I'd stick with that under any circumstance. I know K usually puts down more than any other color else if it's solid " K" and not composite. I don't think I have ever had white cause an issue, other than just overall too much or too little on the varying film types. 

 

Whenever you do figure it out, I'd love to hear what it was. 

 

When that happened to me, the " cracks' before running through anything out of the printer looked like "clear jelly" around the cracks. Likely where it tried to " suck up" the carrier and was overwhelmed. Again, just speculation and could entirely be unrelated. Just figured I'd chime in my experiences with that. 

Edited by johnson4
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  • 2 weeks later...

Problem solved.  Bought as roll of economy cold peel and all the blacks came out solid.   The  Ecofreen Premium Plus hot peel apparently does not like our machine.

I got my new film from DTF Superstore, $60 less a roll, right around the corner from me, and the people there are knowledgeable!

Edited by carlathebluegeckoprinting.
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4 hours ago, carlathebluegeckoprinting. said:

Problem solved.  Bought as roll of economy cold peel and all the blacks came out solid.   The  Ecofreen Premium Plus hot peel apparently does not like our machine.

I got my new film from DTF Superstore, $60 less a roll, right around the corner from me, and the people there are knowledgeable!

The people there also own this forum, great bunch ;) 

glad you got it situated. 

Edited by johnson4
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