Laser plates making issues, please help!!

[CALFORNIAPRINTING]

We used to make our polyester plates (Smart or the paper supplier's brand) on an HP5000 without any problems. This printer got really old and we bought an
HP LaserJet Enterprise 700 Printer M712n (HP advised this would our older printer replacement)
For the life of me we just do not know what we are doing wrong! We just cannot output decent plates for halftone or gradient jobs and lately even the solid printing plates are falling apart!!!!
The toner does not adhere to the plates!!!
We are printing on either a Ryobi 3302 or ABDick 9850 with all the proper solutions and chemicals....
Please help!

 

[OkiTech]

Hi. What you do/did wrong is listened to HP, they were correct as printer advised is really a replacement model but just not for the purpose. they do make them better but could not care less about polyester plates printing performance. Please keep in mind that making a Laser Plates is definitely not the purpose these printers were created for so realistically, taking HP's advise was wrong. From engine to engine, generation to generation manufacturers tend to create the printing process to use low temp melting toner where we need exactly opposite. I think making plates with HP printers will die with last 5100s. If you can return that printer under any sauce - do it. Get a nice 5100, Throw a new PM KIT in it including Fuser, better OEM, get a good tech to disassemble and superclean it including Laser Lenses and you should be set for few more years. Plan B - get Xante PlateMaker4 from EBAY, more expensive than HP - about $800 to $1400 but still most likely less than you paid for new HP, please keep in mind that cartridge and parts, like fuser cost significantly more from Xante than those from HP, on other hand, I had to run the plate 2nd time on my 5100 to make it last longer which added another layer of microscopic background to the plate leading to even more ink framing on the press while plate out of Xante, 1 pass - 10,000 impressions easy.
As far as straight answer - I don't think there is a way to make your new HP make plates. We tried it with HP5200 which is a next generation after 5100 and did not get a good results.
This looks like a good starter:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/HP-LaserJet...55031507?pt=COMP_Printers&hash=item416a398fd3
If you buy it, you can ask the seller to ship you just an engine to save on cost of freight and remove the cartridge, keep it or ship it on the side.
Thechnically, You could ship it to me, I would perfect it, test it (as to make plates and actually print form them) and ship it to you as a ready solution.
I am selling both of my 2 towers (going DI) if buyers won't take our Xante Platemaker 4 as Press+Platemaker deal than It will be for sale.

 

[CALFORNIAPRINTING]

Thanks Unlimited. We will try to return the HP for sure as when we called to inquire about it I was very specific about the use needed and the plans we had for the printer we were buying.
I will look into either the 5100 or the Xante options. Do you work on both brands? Our email is info@micalifornia.com. Please let us know what are the costs involved on setting either one of these options you mentioned.
Also, I forgot to mention, we also operate a Konica Minolta C7000 which we could eventually use for plate making although it would not be ideal as this press needs to be running all the time... we do need a smaller plate maker.
Will the Konica be able to produce enough temp/heat to produce good plates? Thanks a lot for your help!

 

[OkiTech]

KM, I never tried it, I have KM Bizhub Pro C65HC but don't like the idea of making plates on it for number of reasons:
-Toner has too much of wax, I am sure you are aware of UV Coating issue. We tried it - lays like a butter, shines awesome but comes right off with light touch of fingernail. That being said, i don't think toner layer is durable enough + it is kind of low melt.
-If God forbid that plate melts/gets stuck damages anything... Lets just say I'd rather buy one more HP5100
As far you being specific about purpose of printer with HP - simple salesman greed. They would say "Yes yes, by all means it is the better printer for you" even if you'd say that you plan on hammering down nails with it. I bet if you call back complaining that you can't make plates, in better case they will say that your user manual has a fineprint/disclaimer that they guarantee performance only with approved media, in worse case they will void your warranty because you used it for something that printer was not really meant to be used for, person on other end of the wire may not differ poly plate from plywood, especially popular these days overseas tech support and pretty much everything else.
I can work on HP, not only I am a business equipment service engineer, I own printshop and used HP 5100 for years so I may claim that I know what you need. As far as Xante, it is relatively new to me plus Xante hold everything to themselves, there are very little aftermarket alternatives to it. If we/you go with Xante, I can do the labor but if we need parts, there is a good chance that we'd have to go to xante and pay full price. I have done some research and turned out to be that what lays inside the Xante Platemaker is B/W ancient printengine made my Fuji. By measurements of paper printing world it is POS - bulky, slow, expensive but capability to take 13" wide media and running really hot found it's purpose at Xante. Too bad it was dropped by everyone else long time ago so Xante came on top as a winner. I think PressTek bought Xante, to add more bad news to the story. I also have JetPlate system which is defunct bankrupt long time ago but came with Harlequin RIP and Epson 4880 equipped to run aluminum plates. I was planning on to convert it to something called EPSON CTP these days, only one thing missing is baking oven. If I can quickly figure it out, I can offer you more choices. Our Xante PM-4 has less than 200 plates made so it would be a nice buy plus since it is on my floor, I can offer you a sample plate.
Lets get back to this in a day or two - I will Email you with, hopefully, good news.
Roman.

 

[ghuerth]

CalPrint, Unlimited is correct, the low temp is causing the problem. We just bought another HP5000 so we can stop sending the plate twice through, once with an image and again with a period placed off the printing area.