Blueprints

[TeValereJubeo]

I work for a small construction company and we have been looking into getting a large format printer for blueprints printing.

I have two Options available: An older Hp Designjet 1050C, and a Roland Hi-Fi Jet FJ-42

without much experience I only know what I have learned online so far.
Does anyone have any experience printing blueprints on these printers IE cost to run, do the cheap replacements inks last and not gum things up. Any advice would be nice in this situation it would just be nice to able to print full sets of Blueprints to scale at 42" x 30".

Thank you,

 

[OkiTech]

Hi. Question #1 - How many drawings are you planning on making, daily, lets say?
#2 Is ink jet a must? Both units are simply ink-jet printers with next thing - where can I get cheap inks.
How about something like Ricoh 240W or similar? It is Toner based machine. We use one in our copycenter. Toner lasts about 3 rolls of media (750 drawings 24x36) also we can copy, print and scan.
Bottom line is - if you making more than just a couple of quick drawings per day - don't go Ink-Jet.

 

[riky]

I think that the Ink-jet would be better in case you have high volumes of printing, as one of the member said. The choice of the printer actually depends on the work you want that, and the volume of printing required.




Printed Labels

 

[TeValereJubeo]

yep

yep

Thank you for the replies. Here is a little more info. We print between 5 and 30 pages a week depending, we usually wont print more than 30. I agree with you on toner vs ink jet, I never liked cleaning inkjets and always like the quality and quantity you seem to get from toner drums or cartridges. The biggest thing is the printer has to be capable of 42" x 30".

Color would be nice but we really only need B&W.

For the smaller prints 24" x 36" because of the way blueprints are generally laid out on the page and a creative use of a few different programs, I reduce those prints to 50% double my scale and print on inexpensive 11" x 17" with an Epson workforce 1100 and i have to say it is a very basic printer but for 150$ with free ink at the time, it has done about 900 pages i have about 90% ink left on my second set of cartages and its about 40$ a set for brand ink. (I love this printer

What would you guys consider high volume?
What would you consider approprate volume for Ink jet? Laser -Toner based?

Currently we use a print shop for our prints and in fact they are they print shop who services the hp 1050C i was considering buying, so i know it is a well maintained machine.

 

[Nagramos]

May I give a suggestion?
I have a lot of experinece in printing large formats, specifically blueprints, for big construction and engineering companies. After 16 years, I used HP for color and Xerox for black and white.
If you wnat to print up to 30 cad drawings a day, I stroglly recomend you to see Canon IFP755. We bought 5 this year, and they are very fast for the first copy and cheap to buy and keep running. They have six colors and only one print head.
I have a accurate report provided by the printer driver (HP also have one) and in quantity of ink spend for a common blueprint, Canon is more economic than HP.
And, at least here in Brazil, cheaper to buy and with a very nice maintenance service.
If you wish, call me or write me. If I can be useful will be an honor to help.
Nikollas Ramos.
copyhouse.com.br

 

[graficworx]

The only issue I see in using an inkjet vs a thermal or laser blueprint printer is an inkjet will run if it gets wet. If that's not an issue for you, any wide format inkjet should work fine. The HP DesignJet series are real workhorses. What's nice on the HP is you can replace individual heads compared to a single head on Epsons and Canons. This is handy if you run mostly black, as that head will wear out faster. I used to work with a HP 5500PSUV that had a huge print count on it, and still chugged on. The most maintenance it ever needed was a belt and drive motor. Heads would last us about a year of prints (thousands). We printed 36" full color conference preceding posters, sometimes a hundred a week.