Developer change

Can anyone give me some insight into how/when you schedule your developer change?

I am watching the NVMs, toner conc & Vmag, and really am only changing the developer when I get some old-developer type artifacts.

 

If we have a normal work load and have the opportunity to, we change every 100,000. If we get stuck in a lot of low are coverage, black only or non color critical work, we just keep on keepin on. We got to 300k CYM and 450k K just last week.

I'm not a fan of "preventative" maintenance. I just do the 50k HFSIs each shift and the rest I play by quality and necessity. I try to get the most out of everything but once it goes south, it gets replaced.

 

I am on the same track, I was just wondering.

 

Stiv & RMiGen,

Have either of you ever replaced the developer only to have the quality come out worse than before? If so, was it only in one color, multiple or all?

 

From my memory I do not recall that ever happening. I am not the person who changes the developer most times though. When I come in for my shift after the developer has been changed the shift before I remember seeing at least a minor change for the better.

Has this happened to you? You've got me paranoid so maybe I'll keep my eyes open now lol.

 

I've changed developer to try to fix an issue and had it not work. Turned out the developer unit needed to be cleaned out.

I have not changed developer to have it be worse than before though.

 

RMiGen-

Sorry for the scare. Yes, its happened to me and my feeling is that its due to a combination of 1.) running only the minimum count for break-in sheets, 2.) weather, and 3.) consumable parts that need to be replaced or maintained.

The problem always clears up after running a few thousand sheets of a color job that's non-critical on quality.

I have experienced the mottle artifact in half-tones after the developer is changed & broken in...which is the initial reason I performed the procedure in the first place!

But hey, its a whole NEW YEAR now. It's a clean slate and I'm counting on good things. ;-)

 

Is the mottle artifact in the half-tones you see most predominant in black? Our black solid half/quarter-tones don't look very solid. No matter how old the developer is.

 

Yes.

 

When I did my onsite training the analyst said that our black didn't look very good and I told him our developer was at about 20000 and this is how it always looks. He said it should not be that way lol.

I figured other people had the same issue, the black screens do not look solid at all like some of the other colors.

 

Actually, our problem has typically been the opposite: we notice more device shift when the devo is *older* and the problem seems to resolve when we replace. My concern from a color management POV with the iGens has been the effect developer age has on output.

 

Digging up an old thread...

What do you think if the developer gets changed but the HFSI counter does not get reset?

 

That's a good question, and not one that I can answer. I'd have to check with my service guy and get back to you on that one.

 

Well, I have an answer...because I've done it.

BIG SNAFU on my part. I just plain forgot, and had gone ahead with printing after the 1000 sheet break-in. It was roughly 3-4K before I realized it.

The quality seemed fine, but there was a lot of toner spitting. So I reset the counters, and everything hit the fan. It messed everything up. It covered the sheet in a mist of colors, along with heavy toner spitting.

The way I resolved it was by running a few Xerographic Setups, 2-3K sheets of break-in, and some toner concentration nvm adjustments.

If you DON'T reset the HSFI counters, I'm not sure what would happen in the long run. Possibly nothing unusual.

 

Wow. No teacher like experience! Thanks for the intel, my friend!

 

Well I would say most HFSI's are not critical and are just for tracking only. The xerographic ones are more critical. When it comes to belt life, less color variation, preventing spitting, streaking, and reducing your common print quality defects you will wish you rest them right.

With at said I have ran over a 500k 12x18 images without resetting any HFSI'S. Critical no not so much if you forgot to reset one. The printer does adjust voltages to compensate for age HFSI'S. I don't know which are the most critical or the degree to which it adjust but it's not much.
By no means do I suggest you do like me and skip them all it was just not a good idea though the printer did run with very few problems.