Ink Appearance Iridesse vs Ricoh

[kdw75]

Every so often we get mailings or samples that were printed by a print shop about an hour away from us who is running a Xerox Iridesse. Being in a small town, there is a lot of talk about who installs what and it was the first in the area. The solid blacks on it looks noticeably worse than the blacks on our Ricoh 72xxx machines, but it is hard for me to describe what is wrong with it. When they print a black solid on a coated stock it looks dull and flat, it appears that the toner is also laid on the sheet rather thick. By contrast the Ricohs look very similar to offset and the toner seems to be glossier and much thinner.

Does anyone know why this would be? My understanding is that neither use fuser oil, but I believe the Xerox runs at lower temperatures, at least our Versant did.

 

[DYP]

That has not been my observation, but I have not compared much Ricoh output with our Iridesse. With the right settings I am well pleased with the solid blacks of our Iridesse on coated stock. On uncoated I think the Versants were better.

Without knowing what black output setting they might have used and if is was color managed black and what the GCR settings were in their output profile, rich black, or black only it would be hard to make a comparison. If the output is set to 100% black I have no complaints. I actually think it looks better that using rich black.

 

[pippip]

I've found over the years it doesn't matter what press a company has, the operator is generally the determining factor of the quality they produce.

 

[ally170]

I have ran an Iridesse and a 3100, together, for over 2 years now, and have noticed that the 3100 will blow the Iridesse away on uncoated stock, To get a smooth solid colour on coated stock, you need to bump the temp on the fuser pressure roll and belt up by 20oC.

I have not seen sample or prints from a Ricoh, but I keep seeing these types of differences being mentioned on here.

 

[PricelineNegotiator]

I've found over the years it doesn't matter what press a company has, the operator is generally the determining factor of the quality they produce.

True. Was going to say that it was likely them not knowing how to run it properly.

 

[KopyBoss]

We have no issues with solid blacks on coated or uncoated stock when printing on any of our Iridesse's.... Agree with previous post sounds like operator not knowing how to run the machine properly.

 

[kdw75]

I have ran an Iridesse and a 3100, together, for over 2 years now, and have noticed that the 3100 will blow the Iridesse away on uncoated stock, To get a smooth solid colour on coated stock, you need to bump the temp on the fuser pressure roll and belt up by 20oC.

I have not seen sample or prints from a Ricoh, but I keep seeing these types of differences being mentioned on here.

That sounds about right. The toner I keep seeing looks like it hasn't been cooked enough and is still dull and powdery looking. Maybe they are laying down too much without enough heat.