Tafe Illawarra has put a Roland DG RF-640 through its paces, creating signage work for the Worldskills Australia competition. The print shop runs a Roland VersaCamm VS-640 but trialled the RF-640 for five weeks printing a range of self-adhesive vinyl, backlit and banner signage, including a number of full coverage prints, for the Perth contest. A total of 2117sqm, with more than 30 rolls of 1.6 x 50m media, were printed, and 6.22 litres of ink consumed. The Tafe ran comparative jobs on the VS-640, and found that on average the new RF-640 used 36 per cent lesss ink, equating to a saving of more than $1100 for the project.
Michael Doherty, Tafe Illawarra signage training department
Michael Doherty, of the Tafe Illawarra signage training department, who was in charge of the job, says, “From experience with Roland, I knew the RF-640 would be reliable and deliver high quality prints. “After running several jobs through the RF-640 I could tell that it was definitely a lot faster than our VS-640, and I could immediately see the productivity benefits in that. Even at these faster speeds, the print quality was better and images were sharper.” Doherty says he swapped ink cartridges less often, and found the drying time of the new generation inks to be faster. He says, “This was my first experience with the newer Eco-Sol Max 2 inks and from what I could tell the colours were fantastic, which was expected, but the drying time was definitely faster, which I did not really expect to be so noticeable.” The RF-640 is a four colour, 1625mm (64”) printer, with real production speeds of 13 to 18.5sqm an hour, up to a max of 48.5sqm an hour. It uses a mirrored CMYK system with RIPC to avoid banding, prints at 1440dpi and runs with VersaWorks RIP software including built-in Pantone libraries. The machine can be controlled with Roland’s Printer Assist iPad app, and it is Greenguard Gold certified. Roland DG says it has worked on adding usability enhancements to this model. Doherty says, “The front loading inks on the RF-640 were much easier to change, and not as much in the way as top loading inks on the VS-640. “Also, the iPad app is a nice addition. It is a quick and easy way to keep track of your ink usage and a convenient way to control the basic printer functions.” The Tafe handed back the RF-640 at the end of the trial, but Doherty says they will consider the machine next time they need to upgrade. He says, “Our VS-640 is invaluable to our training facility, but technology just keeps improving and after this trial, I will certainly be looking at the RF-640 for our next printer.”
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