What happens to my printer when I go on vacation?It’s the time of the year we all look forward to…Summer! Sun, sand and surf. The kids are out of school and it’s time to pack up the car and get in some great family time, leave the office behind and set your troubles free.
Hold on, not so fast! Your DTG printer is going to get very angry at you if you don’t include it in the vacation schedule.
Don’t Let Your DTG Printer Sit For Long Periods of Time.
Most dtg printers do not do well with idle time. Let them sit for a day or two and you need to allot for extra time to get them up and running normally again. Let them sit for a week and it is going to cost you; possibly a new print head, ink lines, dampers and a few other miscellaneous items. All of which can be prevented if you plan accordingly.
Prep Your Printer Before Departure
Before you head out for some needed R&R, plan to spend a few hours prepping your printer for a needed vacation from ink in the lines as well. Flushing your dtg printer of ink will not only make you sleep well while on vacation, but with regularly schedule flushing’s, will extend the overall life of your printer significantly.
Flushing Ink
The key to successfully flushing ink from your dtg printer is to be sure to use the proper cleaning solution to do so. Many of the ink manufacturers and dtg printer manufacturers offer a cleaning solution that is matched to their inks. There are certain ingredients in CS that are designed to break down the components of water-based pigment ink used in t-shirt production. I know first-hand that it is harmless to switch between proper CS manufacturers products. However, to stray from this kind of proper cleaning solution and use an off-the-shelf hardware store product is to potentially put the life of your dtg printer at risk.
This is not to say that flushing your system has to cost you an arm and a leg as well. CS can be purchased in bulk and it is a simple process with the correct syringe tool to re-fill CS bags or cartridges you may already have in old inventory. As an example, 1500mL of cleaning solution purchased in bulk for a CMYK+WW system will re-fill all six cartridges with 225mL of fluid and have 5oz left over for the finer detailed swabbed head cleans at a cost of approximately $60 USD. At this low cost point, you can afford to “maintain” your printer every two months and still come out far ahead of what otherwise may be cost prohibitive.
To be truly efficient with your lower cost solution, I will let you in on a sure-fire method in maximizing the CS flushing process.
Moving fluid through a dtg printer may vary slightly from system to system, but the concept is the same; activate a pump to pull ink from the cartridges (or bags/bottles) through the lines into the dampers, then the print head and into the waste ink tank. I like to start this process with the ink cartridges removed and not connected to any source to pull fluid from. I run the pump as long as possible until all visible ink has been removed. This should only take 20-30 seconds for most systems. I then insert my CS and activate the pump again. I let the pump run for 10-15 seconds and then remove the CS while the pump is still running. This will introduce air into the ink lines and act as a plunger to remove additional hidden ink deposits. I repeat this procedure several times until certain all ink has been removed. In using this method, I typically only run about half of my CS through the system.
Lastly
Next, I load up an average size test graphic (CMYK squares works best) and run this file on white paper to unsure there isn’t any residual ink left in the print head. If any trace of color prints onto the paper, I repeat the cleaning process one more time for approximately 20-30 seconds, run the CMYK test print again, and hopefully I am only printing clear fluid at this time. Once that is the case and the lines are sufficiently filled with CS, I shut the system off until my triumphant return.
