C14000 and C12000 Problems

Discussion in 'Konica Minolta Color Laser Printers & Copiers' started by ScottCo, Dec 14, 2021.

  1. ScottCo

    ScottCo Member

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    We've had a Konica Minolta 12000 and a 14000 for about seven months now. Great printers but not without issues. Anyone else have either of these printers? I would love to hear about your experience.
     
  2. matthias76

    matthias76 Member

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    Why not share your experiences here !?
    What are your problems with this machine ?
     
  3. jwheeler

    jwheeler Senior Member

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    We have a Konica Minolta C6085 and C7090. Different series engine, but the accessories and general operation are the same throughout. What are the issues you're experiencing?
     
  4. ScottCo

    ScottCo Member

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    Color shifting during runs and a heavy gradient from top to bottom. Nothing consistent enough to get a handle on. We're working with Konica Minolta. They're a solid company. Good people. When these machines work they are a great printer. I thought someone on the forum might have one.
     
  5. Mark Stephens

    Mark Stephens Member

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    Hi Scott,
    We've had a C12000 for the last 2 years,one of the first to go in and all we've had is issues,the IQ unit system is average to say the least and we've had that replaced,I think were on our 2nd or 3rd Fiery,most of the insides have been replaced and numerous control boards.
    It seems like there are weekly issues with print quality,strange glitches were it will print the current job one sided or back it up with a wrong image,honestly I could go on and on ,personally i think the machine was never ready at launch but they sent it out anyway,who knows how many software updates there have been and we're still having.
    The C1085s which we've been running for over 5 years have been excellent,if the fit was better I would have never upgraded.
    What sort of issues have you had?
     
  6. Wuormar

    Wuormar New Member

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    Hi,
    One issue with our 12000 is that the color doesn’t stick properly to the edges with Silk 170 g/m2 or heavier. Have to choose much thicker paper or raise the edge temperatures from 'Expert Adjustments'.
    Problem is only with Silk, any other coated material works fine with right paper selection.
     
  7. Mark Stephens

    Mark Stephens Member

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    Hi ,
    Thats not something we've come across much on the c12000,we sometimes change the temp for odd papers but it should always work for a standard silk material,that sounds like a basic setting the engineer should sort out.
    The only time i've had to mislead the machine for grammage setting is when running the heavier stock on long sheets ,we get marking when running 350gsm plus on the longer sheets so the machine runs better if you tell it its slightly ligther .
     
  8. Wuormar

    Wuormar New Member

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    Thanks for your post. Got to talk to engineer with this thing again.
     
  9. Mark Stephens

    Mark Stephens Member

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    Our machine is down yet again,another motor part failed but again no parts in stock so will have to wait days :-(
    Funny how heidelberg no matter what get parts to you next day but Konica take up to a week!
     
  10. ScottCo

    ScottCo Member

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    Two years? Yes you must have been one of the first to have these machines. I’ve spent the last eight months dealing with one new problem after another - problems with no solution. I’m told an engineer will be out mid February with a software fix for the color density problem but still no solutions for the other issues. Our newest issue is with registration jumping over 5mm during a print run - no fix.

    On the bright side we haven't run out of toner yet...
     
  11. Mark Stephens

    Mark Stephens Member

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    Well that was a biblical week on the C12000.
    Pretty much down for 3 out of 5 days, the glitching errors are getting more frequent,the machine starts printing different sections and pages within a stack this was fairly rare but now 3 times in 3 days,the black dev unit issue is back so we now have a white line down the sheet which is an ongoing issue.
    Our third fiery is coming next week along with the the konica team but i dont hold out much hope!
     
  12. ScottCo

    ScottCo Member

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    Mark, what version of Fiery are you using?
     
  13. Mark Stephens

    Mark Stephens Member

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    Hi Scott,
    Think were on 1.6.06 software,the temporary one theyve installed seems to be ok at the moment but we will give it a few weeks trials,were still waiting on new modded parts for the white line issue,which is a major one as that happened again yeseterday so the machine is down once more.
    From what i can gather the older models of this machine do require new modded parts but the newer versions have been adjusted,I guess i'm one of the unlucky ones,mine was made out of bits from the bin and the factory flooor!
     
  14. Tim Hicks

    Tim Hicks New Member

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    Are these Fiery controllers Windows or Linux based?
     
  15. Michael Waterhouse

    Michael Waterhouse New Member

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    Hi. We're a print company based in South Australia and we've had two C14000s in here since the start of 2021, so around 12 months now. We've had problems with them pretty much from the start. We've used Konica for a number of years and overall are happy with the service they've provided. We have 3 C1100s still running and they've always work pretty much as expected.

    Early on, an issue we noticed was that we got quite a big colour shift when viewing the printed sheets under different lighting conditions. You might suggest that this is to be expected but the variation was too much. Under a calibrated viewing table, the colour was cooler and as you walked away towards normal lighting, the colour became much more warmer. This doesn't happen with any of the other various printing devices and processes we have here. It's almost like it's something to do with the new toner/fuser technology used on these new presses.

    And then while we were getting our heads round that, we came to realise that we couldn't keep any consistency. It started off as us not being able to match a job printed previously. The first print could be way off and then we'd spend time altering curves to try and match, sometimes successfully, sometimes not. This was on every single job. Then we realised that we couldn't even achieve consistency throughout the run of a single print job, let alone match the colour of a previous print. Then we realised that we couldn't always achieve consistency across the sheet with one edge of the sheet not printing to the same density as the opposite edge.

    So in summary, we're currently at a stand off with Konica as we don't accept that these machines are performing like they should.

    Have you managed to resolve any of the issues you we're having? Have Konica accepted any responsibility with anything to do with these presses?
     
  16. jwheeler

    jwheeler Senior Member

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    @Michael Waterhouse , I'm in the USA, so not sure if it's the same in Australia...but KM has the Customer One Guarantee. We got a bad C6085 delivered a few years back which was nothing but problems. We finally called them saying we want to enact the "Customer One Guarantee" document that comes with the statement of work packet, and they replaced it with a brand new engine at no cost. There was a bit of a process where they escalated to a regional specialist that came and inspected the machine to give it the official determination that it was in fact a lemon. I can't find a link on the USA website, but I found it here on the UK website. You should tell them you're asking them to honor that guarantee and be sure to have all of your communications/issues/service calls/samples documented.
     
  17. ScottCo

    ScottCo Member

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    Hello Michael, we just received an update for our 12000 & 14000. The update appeared to address issues relating to color only. I think the update included firmware along with a series of changes to the specific soft switch settings. This was installed on site by one of Konica's head engineers out of California. He said the "Japanese engineers really came through." The update appears to have fixed the problem with color shifting during a single print run. It also helped with that awful problem where the density was different from the top of page to the bottom. There is no name for this update/fix yet and I don't think it is available for download. Hopefully this update along with specific changes to printer settings will be available globally very soon. It would be worth your time to inquire about it.
     
  18. Michael Waterhouse

    Michael Waterhouse New Member

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    Thank you very much for the update to this. We'll do some further investigation into this and hopefully we get some improvements.
     
  19. ScottCo

    ScottCo Member

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    Update...
    We just had the firmware on our 12000 and 14000 updated to version 50. This added some color stability during a single print run. Still working on getting consistency for the same color day to day. We've only had this update one week. It appears to address color only. It does not address any hardware issues.
     

  20. IonutPEO

    IonutPEO New Member

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    Location:
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    Hello
    I am interested in buying a c12000/c14000 or a xerox versant 4100, but I have read a lot of bad things about both options. We are looking for a machine that reproduces colors very well and is very stable over time in terms of color and the position of the image on the paper. we print the book cover in the book on demand regime and both the color and the image must be stable on the paper so as not to have problems with the paperback. At the moment we are using 2 c6085 and we are not satisfied. What do you recommend?
     
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