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| Posted on 3/12/08 at 04:29 PM | |
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OK, here's our story.... We've been doing regular screen printing and embroidery for 15 years and had seen some great stuff happening in the DTG world. We had the chance to purchase a T-Jet from one of our customers who was going out of business. It was never opened, still in the box, but had been sitting in their shop for about a year. The warranty had expired, but the machine was still brand new. (He had a bad car accident just after purchasing it and never got it out of the box.) Anyway, we set it up and tried to print. We printed 20 or 30 test prints of different designs playing with different settings in FastArtist. We saw some potential and were excited about beginning to market our new capabilities, but then we started having problems with the ink catridges not registering. The indicator light on the yellow cartridge came on and wouldn't go off. Called tech support, they gave us some tricks to try...shut it off and restart...a little trick with a business card between the cartridges...take the yellow out and clean the sensors with a pencil eraser...so much in and out of the cartridge that one of the prongs in the carriage bent. We bent it back, but it still wasn't working. At this point, we couldn't be sure if it might be the bent prong or something else, so we took the whole thing apart, replaced the print head carriage and put the whole thing back together...indicator light went off - it's reading the cartidge. Yea! Oh wait, now nothing prints...The carraige moves back and forth but nothing comes out. Called tech support again...they thought it might now be the print head...we tried cleaning the print head, forcing cleaner through from the back. All the heads sprayed, but tech support thought something may be damaged and we should replace the print head. Again we took everything apart, replaced the print head, put it all back together. Still the same problem...carriage moves, nothing comes out. Called tech support again. New diagnosis: bad ribbon cable. Waited 5 weeks for the backordered part from USSPI, took everything apart again, installed the new cable, put it all back together again, and...still nothing! Carriage still moves, no ink comes out. Needless to say, we are quite disapointed. This has been the worst $12,000 investment we've ever made. It has yet to make us a penny. And everyday it sits and we spend hours messing with it, it costs us more and more. We were quite excited about the possiblities of this machine. We have contacts in other shops in town who have Brother machines that run constantly and are making money already. We were very excited to be able to do all that and also print on darks, but so far, we haven't printed on anything! What do we do? We definitely see the advantages of DTG printing and are excited about where the industry is going, but are quickly losing confidence in this machine. Some folks have suggested sending it back to USSPI for a $1,000 refurbish, but quite frankly I'm a little leary about sinking even more money into this T-Jet. Any suggestions? We're really hoping that our next post is a picture of an awesome design that we've just produced for a customer, and not a picture of the broken window that I've just thrown the machine out of! Emmy or Mario Bravo Screen Printing Colorado Springs, CO 719-475-7121 [Edited on 3/12/08 by BravoTees] | ||
 
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