SP-300V some areas are "cloudy" when printed

[tag4u]

Hello
I have an old SP-300V. When I print solid colors, most of the media width it is OK but some areas come out more cloudy. Those are constant areas - somewhere near the right edge (close to the control keypad ) and towards the middle. Tried different rolls, different profiles...
The heads, wipers and captops are pretty new. Can this be related to the encoder strip ? If not - what else to check ?

Some more info :
Nozzles test is perfect - even when I setup the base point to start on the "cloudy" area
Inks are always Roland ECO Max Sol - 4 colors
The problem is not coming from my files since if I move the file to the area which is not "cloudy" - they come out perfect ...
I regularly do manual cleaning
There is no banding on the printings , just cloudy areas

thanks in advance

[Kai Perry]

Can you post some images showing the cloudy areas?

[mrtn]

Turn heaters off and see if anything changes.

Have you by any means changed the pinch rollers yourself?

[tag4u]

Thank you for your time, guys !
Here is a pic, it is printed in High Quality and when I did so - a new artifact became visible : vertical banding. It can be seen at the left side ...

http://api.ning.com/files/Rwzh0kVR*LuFp ... G_0018.JPG

mrtn, I only own the machine for one year and the phenomena is there from the beginning. Maybe the previous owner did. What do you suspect ? What can I check. Tomorrow will print w/o the heaters and update .

it seems that increasing the suction from AUTO to 100% slightly improves the quality at the problematic areas. Does it ring any bells /

thanks again

[mrtn]

I was asking you to turn off the heaters to prevent media from expanding due to heat and lifting up from the media (as it’s got nowhere to go width wise). Your 100% full suction helping also correlates with this as the media is forced to the bed.

Pinch rollers can be an issue if installed the wrong way. They are conical and meant to be installed thicker edges mounted outwards. This guarantees tracking and keeping the media stretched out in width. It would push media inwards if it’s the other way around. Sometimes people “save” money by swapping the unused middle rollers (available in wider machines) for the main rollers. Middle rollers are square and have no tracking ability whatsoever.

[tag4u]

mrtn !
Thanks ! This also probably explains why the problem does not happen when I print on a different media (Sisser, Heat Transfer) which is much more flexible and soft. Probably it does not expand so much. I cant wait to get back to the office to try with the heaters off.
I am pretty sure the the pinch roller's wheels are flat, not conical... Btw : I only have two pinch rollers. Do you know if the SP-300V originally came with more ? And in any case - will it help if I add two more at the middle !?

Thanks again !

[mrtn]

As I mentioned, the middle rollers are available in wider machines. No use in 30" machines. There's no way of installing them either so don't worry about it.

Your rollers are definitely conical, every fixed exterior roller is. It's barely noticeable but very well visible.