Does your Ricoh machine handle tabs well?

[ReproElectroProspero]

Greetings all!

Interesting troubleshooting going on here at the shop. We quite often print 9" x 11" tabs. Usually 5-bank. We would program the tab stock as 5up in our paper tray settings and things would usually go just fine. However, recently, the machine stopped accounting for the fact that these are ordered sets.
For example, say I have a 7 tabs to print. The machine should print 7 tabs, then spit out 3 unused/unprinted tabs to another tray, before starting on the second copy of these tabs.

However, for some reason as of last week the machine refuses to do this. We have the tab stock created correctly as a 1-5 ordered set of tabs, but no matter what we do, the machine will print the 7 tabs, then print on the next tab without spitting out the unused extra tabs, ignoring the fact that these are ordered sets.

I figured, no biggie, let's get a tech in here. Tech says he doesn't think it's possible to control this behavior without paying for / setting tabs up in JobMaster. But it worked fine up until recently! We build all our tabs in InDesign or similar programs, and don't want to have to program the JobMaster ticket every time we need to reprint a book. He's been going up the chain with second level support and says it's simply not possible.

Are we going crazy? Or is this supposed to work without any special software?

Thanks for your insights!

 

[SoggyWinter]

Xerox's Versant 3100 stock library manager has an option to configure tab banks, which causes the press to ejects unused tabs from a set. I can't find that information for Ricoh's stock management. Do you see settings for "modulo" or "set count" or "bank" in the stock settings for the tab media?

According to Google, Ricoh has that option in TotalFlow.

https://help.ricohsoftware.com/swinfocenter/ricoh-totalflow-prep/en-us/totalflow_prep_project.ditamap?onepage=true

 

[ReproElectroProspero]

Xerox's Versant 3100 stock library manager has an option to configure tab banks, which causes the press to ejects unused tabs from a set. I can't find that information for Ricoh's stock management. Do you see settings for "modulo" or "set count" or "bank" in the stock settings for the tab media?

According to Google, Ricoh has that option in TotalFlow.

https://help.ricohsoftware.com/swinfocenter/ricoh-totalflow-prep/en-us/totalflow_prep_project.ditamap?onepage=true

Yes indeed! This is the most frustrating part about this issue for me. I keep asking the tech, why would the Ricoh stock library ask me how many tabs are in a set on tabbed media, if it doesn't care and will just always print on the next page regardless of ordered sets? He just shrugs and says he'll ask his boss and get back to us.

Interesting development we learned today while troubleshooting: If we build a book with tabs, the printer will output unused tabs like it should. It will spit out the extra unused tabs in a different tray, so that the next book's tabs print correctly. HOWEVER, if we take the book out of the equation and try to print ONLY the tabs, using the exact same stock profile, the machine does not do this and only the very first set of tabs prints correctly. It's maddening lol

 

[tngcas]

Our Canon printer has the same thing. It asks us to specify the number in the tab sets but then doesn't appear to actually do anything with the information. It never ejects unused tabs or actually respect that they're supposed to be ordered. IE if there is a paper jam it doesn't reset back to the start or anything useful.

 

[chriscozi]

If I didn't know better I would think that the machine/software companies got hit with a patent offense and decided to remove the feature, quietly, to figure out the next best steps.
Worked before, doesn't now.
YMMV

 

[jwheeler]

Greetings all!

Interesting troubleshooting going on here at the shop. We quite often print 9" x 11" tabs. Usually 5-bank. We would program the tab stock as 5up in our paper tray settings and things would usually go just fine. However, recently, the machine stopped accounting for the fact that these are ordered sets.
For example, say I have a 7 tabs to print. The machine should print 7 tabs, then spit out 3 unused/unprinted tabs to another tray, before starting on the second copy of these tabs.

However, for some reason as of last week the machine refuses to do this. We have the tab stock created correctly as a 1-5 ordered set of tabs, but no matter what we do, the machine will print the 7 tabs, then print on the next tab without spitting out the unused extra tabs, ignoring the fact that these are ordered sets.

I figured, no biggie, let's get a tech in here. Tech says he doesn't think it's possible to control this behavior without paying for / setting tabs up in JobMaster. But it worked fine up until recently! We build all our tabs in InDesign or similar programs, and don't want to have to program the JobMaster ticket every time we need to reprint a book. He's been going up the chain with second level support and says it's simply not possible.

Are we going crazy? Or is this supposed to work without any special software?

Thanks for your insights!

Aside from telling it how many tabs are in a set, do you have the setting on to eject unused tabs at the machine level and in the Fiery? It may have been on by default at some point and got turned off. I don't have a Ricoh so I just did a quick search on the Fiery forum.

One posting explains that you also have to define where those excess tabs get kicked out to: "When inserting tabs in Mixed Media, select "Output Tray to Kick Out Unused Tabs", and then choose the desired output tray from the drop-down menu."

Another posting about a Canon for @tngcas states that you have to first set it on the machine itself: "It’s accessed by pressing the Settings/Registration Key. Then Go to Functions CommonPaper Output Settings. You’ll see a selection called “Unprocessed Tab Paper Forced Output”. That has to be changed to “Yes”.

I also saw this note in operating manual for a Ricoh 8300, so I'd assume it's similar for your machine. It appears that you have to set it in the paper tray settings on the machine. We have to do this with our KM as well:
When paper in trays that are set to automatically eject unnecessary tab stock sheets runs out, reload the tab stock from the beginning of the cycle (the first sheet)

 

[chriscozi]

That won't/shouldn't matter for sets run independently which the poster says is happening also.
YMMV

 

[ReproElectroProspero]

Aside from telling it how many tabs are in a set, do you have the setting on to eject unused tabs at the machine level and in the Fiery? It may have been on by default at some point and got turned off. I don't have a Ricoh so I just did a quick search on the Fiery forum.

One posting explains that you also have to define where those excess tabs get kicked out to: "When inserting tabs in Mixed Media, select "Output Tray to Kick Out Unused Tabs", and then choose the desired output tray from the drop-down menu."

Another posting about a Canon for @tngcas states that you have to first set it on the machine itself: "It’s accessed by pressing the Settings/Registration Key. Then Go to Functions CommonPaper Output Settings. You’ll see a selection called “Unprocessed Tab Paper Forced Output”. That has to be changed to “Yes”.

I also saw this note in operating manual for a Ricoh 8300, so I'd assume it's similar for your machine. It appears that you have to set it in the paper tray settings on the machine. We have to do this with our KM as well:
When paper in trays that are set to automatically eject unnecessary tab stock sheets runs out, reload the tab stock from the beginning of the cycle (the first sheet)

That won't/shouldn't matter for sets run independently which the poster says is happening also.
YMMV

@chriscozi is correct, @jwheeler - that setting is for mixed media specifically, which still seems to work. If we define page 4, 18, 28, 53, 64, and 84 as tab stock, (just an example), then the machine will kick out the unused extras, even if we don't specifically tell it which output tray to spit unused tabs to. However, that setting does not apply when we're just running tab stock only...it's only for mixed media. The main problem is occuring when we're trying to run many sets of tabs as the only media being used.

 

[jwheeler]

@chriscozi is correct, @jwheeler - that setting is for mixed media specifically, which still seems to work. If we define page 4, 18, 28, 53, 64, and 84 as tab stock, (just an example), then the machine will kick out the unused extras, even if we don't specifically tell it which output tray to spit unused tabs to. However, that setting does not apply when we're just running tab stock only...it's only for mixed media. The main problem is occuring when we're trying to run many sets of tabs as the only media being used.

Gotcha @chriscozi and @ReproElectroProspero. I remember having something similar to this on our KM. Our solution was to just add a blank 8.5x11 page of 20# bond before the tabs to make it a "mixed media" job.

 

[bcr]

@chriscozi is correct, @jwheeler - that setting is for mixed media specifically, which still seems to work. If we define page 4, 18, 28, 53, 64, and 84 as tab stock, (just an example), then the machine will kick out the unused extras, even if we don't specifically tell it which output tray to spit unused tabs to. However, that setting does not apply when we're just running tab stock only...it's only for mixed media. The main problem is occuring when we're trying to run many sets of tabs as the only media being used.

I don't know what machine you are using but I print a lot of tabs on c5310s.

It's not true that you need jobmaster for tabs.

Until recently I was printing everything via PS connection from Totalflow Prep into CWS and any leftover tabs would appear at the end of the job. So not kicked out, but the complete set was cleared at the input tray at least to allow correct printing of the next document.

More recently I started to use JDF/PDF connection and I have been able to use tab kickout in some situations.

I have found in TF prep that it will not allow you to create a job consisting only of tabs- not sure why as it's very annoying. You have to have at least one "normal" sheet included.

I think you have figured the issue out which is that tab kickout isn't functioning correctly when printing purely tabs. I wonder whether it's related to the TF prep issue. Do they for some reason not want users to print tab only jobs - similarly to how you can't run docs for finishing through the post inserter without any printed pages included?