Solved: Problem printing GO

[IJM_TechSupport]

Together, I’m sure we can find the solution to this annoying/strange issue! I am currently reviewing the service manual and looking into the various sensors, such as the Ink Mark Sensor, PE Sensor, Paper Thickness Sensor and PW Sensor (to start with)… I’m starting with IM and PW sensors, as they seem to have the most to do with detecting the paper and ink mark. LOTS of testing, reading/researching, and more testing!!

I’ll keep you posted, and appreciate if you do the same!

Thanks and best regards~ Dana

[kdphotography]

I think I may be onto something here, at least in regard to a workaround. I’m busy so not enough time to play with this idea more, but so far, it worked on my first print this morning—that wouldn’t print the GO completely.

No problem printing the B&W initial print right? Looks good, just difficulties with the GO.

Okay, first print on a 24" roll, single image is about 11x14.5, on a roll, sheet at 24x20. Dry the print and try to apply the GO. GO coverage fails, normal workflow.
Okay, second print on 24" roll, same image. I designate a different paper size, at 21x20. GO coverage gets narrower, but fails/stops at about the same spot!
Okay, third print on a 24" roll, same image, 24x20. But this time I change things up more.

1. Initial print is on 9890 Printer, Cone 5 and 9890 Cone 5 curve, 9890 Quad. 24x20, 2880, unilateral. Dry the print.
2. Here’s the change, on the GO printing: From QTR, upper right corner, Epson printer selected remains 9890, but—instead I select print model as Quad 9800 K7 (my old 9800 piez printer, bless her soul)
3. Sheet loaded 24x20. I bring up my curves that I used for the 9800K7—which is the 7880. Select 7880 GO 30000 for the GO curve. 1440, bilateral. And print. It worked.

I need time to try this again to make sure it is not an anomaly, but busy and have to go…

Sure there are more steps going back and forth between the two different selected Quads on QTR, but this may be a workaround…

Fingers-crossed… I’ll play some more later.

ken

[colorfolio]

From my experience with this problem, one success does not indicate … success. On numerous occasions, I have been unable to print GO, try some variation on the workflow and have it work, sometimes 3 or 4 times in a row - and then fail on the next. One thing that makes this problem a challenge, at least in my studio, is that the failures are intermittent. Meaning you’ll have to be able to print successfully perhaps 8-10 times (hopefully not more!) with a given solution before believing it to be reliable.

But do keep us posted about your attempts in case this is reliable! Would one have to actually have had a 9800 installed at some point to make this work? Or is all the software or settings needed come with QTR?

Bob

[IJM_TechSupport]

Hi Ken~ Thanks for your input and testing. I really appreciate the outside help as I’m putting as much time as I possibly can into trying to find a solution for this GO printing issue, but am also working on tech support, other R+D projects, and production printing every day. As Bob pointed out, one successful GO print doesn’t mean it will necessarily work every time… I have been excited and thought I discovered a solution a few times, but did not get consistent results. From what you say about selecting the printer models, it sounds like you are printing from a PC. I am certainly interested in hearing what you try and the results you get, though I don’t believe this would work with a Mac- but would certainly test that theory if you feel this workflow of selecting the 9800-K7 works consistently with your 9890 printer printing from a PC.

Thanks again, and I will keep you posted on my testing. I am calling Epson momentarily, and will let you know what they say (though I always feel like I know about these printers than the Epson support people, so am not very confident they’ll be any help- but it’s worth asking!).

All the best~ Dana

[kdphotography]

Totally agree with you here, Bob (and Dana)!

I’m swamped here, but will be continuing my efforts, taking notes, and hopefully we can come up with a workaround that works consistently every time. It’s hard to figure out the solution when the failure to completely print the GO is sporadic and occurs without much rhyme or reason… I’ll be trying to do some printing later today. Fingers-crossed!

Btw, you can install other printers/curves into your QTR—so should not be an issue, at least if you’re on PC like me. Not familiar with Mac. I just happened to still have the old 9800 quad and curves still available…

ken

[IJM_TechSupport]

Ok, I just got off the phone with a gentleman at Epson support. He was very helpful and said they have received a lot of calls about issues printing over existing prints. He explained this is only an issue with the 7890/9890, 7900/9900 and 4900 printers because they added an optical paper sensor (called the PW Sensor) to the print head. This sensor is not in previous or newest printer models, as they realized this is an issue. This sensor has many responsibilities, including checking the alignment, paper size and skew. Disabling the paper size and skew check in the printer menu will not fix or effect the problem, and they explained this sensor can not be disabled, disconnected or tricked. The optical paper sensor constantly reads the paper during printing, so the top or side white paper margins don’t matter, if it sees what it thinks is the end of the paper, it will stop printing. Sometimes it will see printed area and stop printing, but other times it will not see the print and successfully print a second layer over the entire sheet, so the results are not consistent (as we have come to realize after much testing).

[FONT=arial]Prior to releasing Piezography for these printer models, our test results were great and this printer sensor issue wasn’t discovered until later. Unfortunately, we have no control over the printers, nor can we foresee and avoid all possible issues, though we do put a lot of time into researching and testing our products prior to release, and continue to use our carts and inks every day to ensure the highest quality products and knowledge of our products. Epson has recognized the problem this sensor is causing, and has abandoned it for their new printers. Unfortunately, their new SureColor S-series printers are MUCH more expensive than the previous models, and it’s very possible they would not be supported by QTR.

[FONT=arial]At this point, the solutions are: [/FONT]
[FONT=arial]1. Get a second printer (I recommend a 7600/9600, 7800/9800 or 7880/9880) to use as a GO coating machine, which will ultimately double your production to have one printing ink and the other printing GO (we have a 7600 set up as a GO only printer, and it works great). The GO printer should be in ok condition, but doesn’t need to be in perfect (as you want for the ink printer). As long as it has at least one good print head channel, you can use it or GO printing. [/FONT]
[FONT=arial]2. Manually spray coat the prints using Hahnemuhle, Lumijet or a similar glossy protective spray for inkjet. The drawbacks of this are that you need a very clean and well ventilated area to spray, and it takes some practice to get a nice even coating. [/FONT]
[FONT=arial]3. We have already spent a great deal of time trying to find a way to print GO at the same time as ink. In past attempts, we got close, but there was always some sort of imperfection that were not happy with, and discovered the second pass GO coating over dry ink produces the best results, so abandoned the simultaneous printing idea… We will attempt this idea again, though are not hopeful it will work, and would not be able to do this for all glossy papers, because the GO limit may ultimately different from paper to paper. Printing GO at the same time also increases the overall ink limit and can effect the print detail. As perfectionists and the developers of Piezography- we require crisp detail, even gloss finish with no bronzing (we are not easily satisfied), so we will spend some time on this possibly as early as tomorrow, but can’t make any promises that it will work to our satisfaction in order to offer as a solution for our customers. [/FONT]
[FONT=arial]
[/FONT]
[FONT=arial]I will keep you posted with our test results. In the meantime, getting a second printer for printing the GO layer is the best option for consistent results. [/FONT]
[FONT=arial]Best regards~ Dana :)[/FONT]

[/FONT]

[kdphotography]

Well, I have a 9900, 9890 (Piezography printer), and a 4800 in studio. And this doesn’t include my dye sub event printers. I simply don’t have room for a dedicated GO printer. And Dana probably knows me well enough that if I bought another wide format printer presumably for GO, I’d end up converting it to be another piezography printer! :rolleyes: A dedicated GO printer is not an acceptable solution for me. And I purchased a new 9890 to convert to K7 piezography specifically to enable printing both matte and glossy B&W, as well as allow using the GO option on prints coming off my 9900. So I want GO output from the 9890 to work!

I’m still confident that a workaround exists for 9890/9900 K7 printer owners. I’m one of those that isn’t afraid to try something if it’ll make things work. And the wasted yards of Cone 5 are a testament to that. If Dana asked me to dance naked around my 9890 chanting and burning sage, I’d do it if it meant better B&W prints for the studio. :eek:

I haven’t had the time to print a lot of B&W on the 9890 over the past couple days, but so far, GO on my 9890 has been working (knock on wood). Not a large number of prints, but I’m six for six printing 24x16 off a 24" roll of Cone 5.

This is my workflow for glossy K7 piezography on my 9890. Printing from a dedicated Dell PC laptop, Win7 Professional, QTR.

1. Print image normally (this isn’t the problem area). Printing from roll, 9890, Quad 9890; 2880, Unilateral, 9890 Cone 5 curve. Dry print.
2. Load sheet. From QTR, printer selected remains Epson Stylus Pro 9890. Here’s the change: I then select a different print model. I select Quad9800-K7. Curve selected is 7880-30000 GO. 2880 (yes, that’s right), bilateral. Print the GO using the 1" white square.

So far so good. For whatever reason, selecting Quad9800-K7 makes my 9890 act like a different printer. And it works for printing the GO on my 9890 (so far, knock on wood). What I’ve found is that if I print the GO at 1440, the printer outputs the GO at a ridiculously fast rate, the print head shuttling back and forth quickly like an old charlie chaplin movie. On further inspection, the print is indeed still covered completely. It may be my eyes, but the GO seems to be “thin” at 1440. You can see the 1/8" uncoated margins on the edges of the sheet, so it is fully covered. I haven’t tried the 1440 “super” option (this only appears if Quad9800-K7 is designated), but now only use 2880 as the setting for GO, and this slows down the output and the GO seems (in my twisted mind at least) to be goldilocks just right. The only thing I’ve found is that the GO stops printing maybe ~1/2" at the end of the sheet, rather than the usual 1/8".

I don’t know the who, what, why, where, or how----but this has been working so far for me. And I hope this can prove to be a consistent workaround. Anyone else want to give it a try and report back? All I can say is that I know computers and even printers can be somewhat finicky, and trying different things that don’t make complete sense, sometimes just works. I’m not familiar with printing K7 from mac, so don’t know if this is a pc only possible workaround. More testing will reveal if this is a consistent workaround. If it does prove worthwhile, then even if you are on an Apple platform, buying an inexpensive dedicated PC laptop for printing is still better than buying a huge 44" dedicated GO printer. I’ll continue testing and try to do more B&W printing this weekend—but my Cone 5 stash is pretty low!

ken

[IJM_TechSupport]

Thanks for your feedback Ken. I appreciate the support and like you, still believe there is an answer and don’t easily accept defeat or being told something can’t work- I like to prove failure wrong
I certainly understand not having enough room to add a GO dedicated printer to your collection, but that is currently the only solid answer to this strange and annoying sensor issue.

I am happy to hear you have 6 of 6 good gloss prints, and will test your workflow with our 7900 ASAP on a PC, then in I get consistent results, will try to translate that workflow to a Mac environment.
Are your 6 good prints all the same image, or different images? What is the overall density of the underlaying image(s)- mostly light and mid-tones, or is there a fair amount of dark and/or large areas of similar density?
The ~1/2" bottom margin is normal for all printer models (this is the Epson maximum printable area), the end margin is necessary for the printer to hold onto the end of the sheet while printing. QTR uses the printer’s maximum printable area (as per the Epson printer manual), and does not support borderless printing.

Please keep me posted, and I will do the same!
Thanks again and all the best~ Dana

[kdphotography]

Hi Dana. The prints are different images, with a good mixture of different tones. Just did another K7 glossy print—still no problems applying the GO using this modified workflow on the 9890. (Knock on wood). I’ll need to call in an order for more Cone 5… I’ll see if throwing in some different variables will do anything. The one thing that makes me think there is a software workaround (which is essentially what my workflow is right now) is that when using QTR in applying the GO, the speed at which the print head moves in coating with the GO changes quite a bit when printing the GO at 1440 or 2880. I haven’t tried 1440 super. 2880 for the GO seems to be the best setting using this workaround. Is the 9890 printer sensor somehow turned off? Dunno, but when using the pseudo-quad9800 mode for GO it shows some promise…

ken

[IJM_TechSupport]

Thanks for the additional information Ken. It is very promising that you have had 100% success GO printing using this workflow with a variety of different images that have a mixture of tones. I should have time to do some testing on my end later this week and will keep you posted with my results.

Based on what I have read and what the Epson tech support guy said, this sensor can not be disconnected or turned off- but we may still find a way around it!

More to come soon, thanks again for your testing and input.
All the best~ Dana

[IJM_TechSupport]

Ok, I tried your workflow Ken and got the exact same results I have been getting all along… I have been printing with our 7900, which is set up with ConeColor Pro inks, but the color/inks shouldn’t matter to test if I can successfully make a print over an existing print. I have been printing a diagonal gradient image (and have also tried several other images) thru QTR, then printing the 1x1 white square with the GO curve with all possible settings, including selecting the 7900-K7 as well as the 7880-K7 as you are doing. I have also tried printing a LLK flush image thru QTR’s Calibration Mode with a variety of settings as another way to print a layer of pure ink from that channel, and got the same results as when I print the white image thru the GO curve. Every time, the “GO” layer stops when it reaches the the beginning of the black area (this is when I load the light end of the gradient print first). I have successfully printed over the whole sheet if I load the gradient dark end first, but need to feel confident in the ability to consistently overprint on any type of image. I am very happy this workflow is working well for you, but don’t feel this is the solution for everyone- but certainly, keep using it since it’s working well in your case!

Best regards and happy printing~ Dana

[kdphotography]

Bummer, Dana.

I don’t know if it makes any difference, but from QTR (using a pc laptop, Win7pro), the printer “Name” selected is still the Epson Stylus Pro 9890 in the top right box; below that is another box for selecting the “Printing Model,” in which I use “Quad9800-K7” for printing the GO only. Below, in the curves section of QTR, I select the 7880-30000GO; 2880, and bidirectional.

So far (knock on wood), this has been working for me without a single hiccup. And no, I haven’t been dancing around the printer naked chanting and burning sage… I only do that for fun on the weekends. :eek: I’ll keep testing here. I’ve kept all my old prints, taking notes, and try to see if there is a particular pattern/settings that work/fail.

ken

[IJM_TechSupport]

I will try the Quad7800-K7 to see if it gives me any different results than the 7880-K7 I tried yesterday, and let you know if that gives me different results. I have been testing with a Windows Vista machine, but could also test 7 to see if that makes any difference.

Thanks again for your testing, note taking and updates- it’s a big help to have some outside help/input.

Best regards and happy printing~ Dana

[kdphotography]

Dana,

I forgot. When you get the chance, can you send me a full res tiff of the diagonal gradient image that you have been using to print? This will help to remove another variable on my side. I’ll test more (with all my free time… :rolleyes:)

Dropbox or yousendit would be great. Kendoophoto@sbcglobal.net

Thanks! ken

[IJM_TechSupport]

Will do Ken!

[m-qvale]

Hi

I am printing on a Epson 9900 with K7 ink and GO.

The promblem is that the printing itself is fine, but the GO-print stops in the middle of the printing so that only half the image is covered.
Sometimes the print will go through, but not very often.

Does anybody have a solution to this problem? How can we make sure that the GO covers the entire print every time?

[IJM_TechSupport]

There have not yet been any solid answers to this strange problem, but some people have reported success when leaving about 3" margins on the side, so the printer sees white paper on both sides on the image as it passes over, and continues printing GO Over the entire sheet. Here is what I’ve been telling others recently:

[FONT=ArialMT]We have done extensive testing since discovering this issue, and gathered info from several customers using the x900/x890/x700 printers for Piezography gloss. We concluded the printer sensor is detecting what it thinks is the end of the paper when it sees dark ink area, and stops printing. There is no solid “fix” that is consistent and works in all cases, though some people have experienced success by printing a white image the full size of the paper they’re printing on (as you’re doing), leaving 2-3” white margins around the image (so the sensor “sees” white paper and doesn’t stop printing), and one customer feels he gets good results by selecting the 9800 printer model in his QTR window, but as I said none of our thoughts or customer reported “solutions” have been consistent or worked in every situation. This issue has been difficult to trouble shoot (and we’ve spent a great deal of time trying to figure it out), because results are random, and can not be duplicated from one printer to the next. I called and spoke to Epson to try figuring out how we can get the printers to print over an existing print, and they told me they’ve received many calls about this (because it’s always been possible up until these models), and it’s caused by the paper sensor on the print head. This sensor also controls other things like detects paper skew and size, as well as reads auto nozzle checks and alignments. The printer will not work if the sensor is removed or disconnected. I even tried tricking the sensor by applying a piece of white paper over it, but that didn’t work either. The only help Epson could offer is to suggest getting a new T-series printer, which doesn’t have this sensor, and is actually designed to print over prints- but, that’s not a realistic solution because those printers are MUCH more expensive. [/FONT]
[FONT=ArialMT]
[/FONT]
[FONT=ArialMT]We are testing a new RIP that may be able to bypass the paper sensor, and provide consistent overprinting for these models. I’m sure we’ll be very excited to announce the results if it works as we’re told it will. Although getting a T-series printer is out of the question because of the expense (not to mention we don’t even know if it can be run by QTR or another RIP to have individual channel control), a good solution is to get a decent working 7800/9800 or 7880/9880, which have NO problems printing Gloss Overprint. It will speed up your production to have a separate printer for applying GO, and give you smooth, consistent results every time. We have six 7880/9880 printers, with five set up with different Piezography ink tones, and all print matte and gloss using the “P2” ink configuration- they are fantastic machines.

Best regards~ Dana [/FONT]

[BILL]

Hi Dana,

Did you ever get that RIP up and running? Is it now possible to print glossy on 7890/9890 printers? I’ve still got 9 cartridges for Special Edition inks & bottles gathering dust…I’m currently reviewing my printing flow and I thought I’d check…

Regards,

Bill

[jon]

[QUOTE=BILL;8726]Hi Dana,

Did you ever get that RIP up and running? Is it now possible to print glossy on 7890/9890 printers? I’ve still got 9 cartridges for Special Edition inks & bottles gathering dust…I’m currently reviewing my printing flow and I thought I’d check…

Regards,

Bill[/QUOTE]

Hi Bill,

No it did not work to our satisfaction.
It is possible to print GO on the 7890/9890 printers for many. Have you tested your printer to see if its capable of double printing (meaning make a color print and then feed it back in and print over itself again.) Try different margin sizes if you are unable to - most people have a sensor that picks up the error based upon margin size. The printer thinks the paper has run out. So having wide margins seems to help those with that type of sensor. Others are totally unaffected.

Jon

[BILL]

Thanks Jon,

You got a ball park figure for a margin size which works?

Regards,

Bill