Maintenance and Troubleshooting
Standard printer maintenance:
Clean daily:
• Waste ink drain bottle (when starting the day)
• Flushing stage
• Front roller
• Printing table and media guides
• Front and rear dancing bar
• Capping unit and its surroundings
• Wipers (when finishing the day)
• Print nozzle checks on paper (if possible) daily to monitor
printer and nozzle status
Clean weekly:
• Head baseplate
• Machine’s exterior
Clean monthly:
• Machine’s interior
• Encoder strip
• Capping unit (deep cleaning)
Bear in mind that the following maintenance periods are
suggestions. Maintenance intervals mostly depend on
printer usage, the type of fabrics, and the cleanliness of the
surrounding environment. If the unit is heavily used (16-24
hours run for example), with fabrics with heavy coatings, or in
dusty environments, we would recommend the user increase
maintenance frequency.
Always follow manufacturer’s
suggested maintenance
.
Troubleshooting Tips:
• Missing nozzles after an ink changeover should come back
with time. It is best practice to perform multiple purges and let
the new ink sit overnight so that air settles out of the system.
• Initial jetting sustainability may be poor as air works its way
out of the system. This can be overcome by printing at slower
speeds before ramping up to normal printing speeds.
• After an ink change, ensure filters are free of trapped air.
If air entrapment occurs and restricts ink flow, bleed air as
necessary.
• Severe starvation may be a symptom of restricted flow
through the last chance filters. Additional replacement of the
last chance filters may be required.
• Do not over-exercise the print heads if you observe starvation
symptoms as this will affect the life of the printhead. If this
occurs, verify all filters and ink feed lines are free of trapped
air, then check the negative pressure setting.
• If the machine is misting, this could be caused by excessive
print gap. Check the print gap to make sure you have the right
height.
• Nozzle plate wetting or dripping from the print head could
be caused from air in the ink lines or not having the negative
pressure set correctly.
• If banding and/or misdirects occur, check the alignment of the
printer and purge the print head.
Technical Data
Storage Temperature and Shelf Life
It is recommended that Artistri
®
Xite P1500 Pigment Inks
be stored in sealed containers in a clean, dry area, with
temperatures regulated between 10 – 40°C (50 – 104°F). Improper
storage temperatures or storage of open ink containers in
dusty, ambient conditions may shorten the ink’s shelf life. When
properly stored your DuPont inks should last at least 12 months.
Ink Physical Properties
The table below lists the pertinent physical ink parameters of the
Artistri
®
Xite P1500 CMYK inks.
Physical Properties
n
P1510
n
P1520
n
P1530
n
P1540
pH, as made
7.0 – 9.0
7.0 – 9.0
7.0 – 9.0
7.0 – 9.0
Viscosity 25°C (cP)
3.0 – 5.0
3.0 – 5.0
3.0 – 5.0
3.0 – 5.0
Surface tension (mN/m)
23 – 29
23 – 29
23 – 29
23 – 29
Jetting Properties
1. De-gassing
DuPont recommends de-gassing ink to achieve <2ppm dissolved
oxygen.
2. Effect of Head Temperature on Viscosity
These inks have been extensively tested on Epson print heads
operation at 25°C. Some customers prefer higher operating
temperatures. Keep in mind that higher operating temperatures
accelerate evaporation of volatile components and may affect
latency and increase maintenance frequency. The graph below
can be used to aid your selection of operating parameters for
your print head.
Temperature (°C)
Visc
osity (cP)
15
25
35
45
5.0
4.5
4.0
4.5
3.0
2.5
2.0
