Registration on a Ryobi 3302

[jimas67]

I'm having problems getting the registration to hold on a Ryobi 3302. I can get the press to register for about a 100 sheets or so but then the registration starts to bounce. We have had this press for about 4 months now, we bought it from our service tech, and since he is not a printer I got about 2 hours of training on it and the rest has been pretty much up to me. I give it the least amount of push but enough to straighten out the papr, I have been going back and forth on the buckle settings, seems like 1 1/2 turn is better than 1 1/4 on the roll of the buckle. Any suggestions?

 

[Al Ferrari]

I ran one of these for about 10 years, until I had to close the shop. I got very good register out of mine. Let's see if I remember enough to help you.

How much experience do you have? Have you printed with good register on other presses? Which ones?

Is the trouble with text weight or cover stock?
Is the stock cut square, and all the same size?
Are you limited to the ball bearing type of feed board wheels that came with the press, or do you have some brush wheels you can use?
Are you placing wheels just at the tail of the sheet? These should be the light ones. Brush wheels would be better.
Are you using a light "feather" spring opposite the push guide?
How fast are you running? is the problem worse a higher speeds, and less at slower speeds? Big difference, or small difference?

Try to answer all if you can.

Al

 

[RGPW17100]

Curl up is going to give you grief. Right where the sheet goes into the press from the feeder board there are two brass feelers bolted with two screws each just above where the sheet goes in. These are to help guide the sheet into the grippers. Take them out. 90 percent of the time you do not need these. They can cause binding and not allow the sheet to side guide smoothly. Make sure you have very minimal spring deflection when side guiding and that the metal wheels are just kissing the back end of the sheet before entering the press. Sorry cant remember the buckle setting.

 

[jimas67]

Thanks Al and Rgpw for responding. I will try taking off the feelers off the feed board. Al I have been printing for about 20 years. Many moons ago I ran a multilith with the same type of feed board, so I'm a little familiar with this type. I usually run a Ryobi 2800 2 color, a Halm jet press and when the other pressman is on vacation I run a KBA performa 74, 4 color press with a coater. I've been printing 4 color for about 4 years. I like it, it got me out of the same old thing everyday.
It seems I'm having trouble with the heavier stock 80-100 lb. usually cover. The paper is square, our cutter operator usually does a back trim to make sure it is square. I am limited to the ball bearing feed wheels and place them just slighty off the edge of the paper when it hits the finger stops. I have three sets of these wheels, is there a difference in the weight of these or are they all the same? I used the lightest set of springs I have the heavier ones make it worse. I usually run at 5 or 6 sometimes slower(running that slow makes ink start running down the side of my plate because the water can't keep up, it has crestlines on it) running at 7 sometimes I will get a good 100 then the registration goes off, not alot, but if I'm doing 3 or 4 color work that's not good. My shop bought the press used and I have done ALOT of cleaning on this press. Whoever ran this machine did not take care of it and I just got lucky and talked my boss into getting new rollers for the water system and the forms. I do have manual for the press but sometimes they give ideas but can't to seem to solve my problem. I appreciate any suggestions you have.

Thanks
Sami

 

[Al Ferrari]

Hi Sami,

It sounds like you have a good amount of experience.

But we don't have a description of the type of miss-register: front to back, side to side, or a cocking of the sheet?

Are you using metal straps at the edges of the sheet to keep the stock from running over the far guide feather spring? And do you move a feed board tape over right near the far guide to keep the stock from going under it?

As for the feed board wheels, my new machine came with one pair that was not the of the ball bearing type, but solid hard bakalite ones that were lighter than the ball bearing ones. Make sure that all feed board wheels, especially the ones at the tail of the sheet are clean, lubricated and free turning.

Incidentally, you have not mentioned if it is a particular stock size that gives more register trouble.

The feed roller pressure at the stop fingers, is set as a timing: something like turning the press forward by hand with no stock fed, while testing with a finger to find the point at which the upper steel feed roller just contacts the lower rubber one, continuing to turn and counting, from that point on, the number of whole and partial turns of the upper feed roller until it is free again (there is a hole on the left side of the upper steel roller to use for counting the turns, set it horizontal just as they make contact). This should be 1 and 1/4 turns of the upper feed roller. Check the manual on this for where and what to adjust to achieve this setting. Now, the up/down movement of the frame that holds the upper feed roller (the elevating frame), is actuated by a cam follower on the side (the left one I believe) which rides a cam bad on the blanket cylinder. It could be that wear due to lack of lubrication has developed to the extent that that little cam follower wobbles and walks off the cam band when things warm up after 100 sheets or so. There may also be some undesirable play of the elevating frame. Get rid of it.

Another, perhaps stronger possibility is that the gripper pads on the cylinder grippers are either not set correctly, and/or the rubber coating on the tips of those grippers is worn and needs replacing. As I recall, there is a separate service manual for that press. Do you have that? Try getting it from Ryobi, a dealer, or on e-bay. It will explain how to set those grippers. The service guy who sold you the press should have set these. Did he claim to have done some basic restorative work on the machine prior to selling it, or was he "letting it go as is" at an attractive price? Anyway, if those are set correctly, but with worn rubber tips, then the solution is to replace them by new/newer ones. As a short term fix, the ones on the very ends on each side may be less worn than the rest and could be moved in toward the center, until new replacements arrive.

Report back.

Al

 

[jdaghir]

You have already gotten some good advice but I have a few more tips. I haven't ran a Ryobi 3302, but I have ran an Hamada H234 which is very similar.

1. Since it has push guides instead of pull guides, in order to get the best registration your paper needs to be grain short when feeding portrait or grain long when feeding landscape.

2. Feed landscape or shorter sheets when possible to reduce tail-whip. In other words, if your final trim size is 8.5x11, run it 1 up on 9x12 instead of 2 up on 12x18. And 9x12 landscape feed is better than 9x12 portrait feed.

3. If the Ryobi allows you to switch which side guide jogs and which one is fixed (the Hamada allows you to do this, not sure about the Ryobi) set the side guide with the spring to jog and the side guide without the spring to be fixed so that the spring is pushing the sheet into contact with the side guide rather than side guide pushing the sheet into contact with the spring. This helps reduce tail-whip a little bit as the sheet stays in contact with the side-guide even after the spring has jogged away from the sheet, plus it makes it a little easer to visually see that the sheet is in fact getting properly jogged up against the side guide and that it is staying that way after the grippers grab it and the spring jogs away.

With the Hamada most of my registration problems were either side to side or skew (tail-whip). Front to back registration was usually very good unless you had the buckle way off.

Good luck.

 

[Richard]

3302 register

3302 register

I've been told, and learned, that register starts at the feed table.
The pull out rollers must have even pressure, and not too tight.
If the sheet, or envelope, is fed in crooked, thats bad. Once you see the sheet is
going down the table strait, thats good.
The fixed side guide can be twisted. So if the sheet is travelling down the table strait, you want to be sure your sideguide is justified with it. Don't rely on the side guide to make a crooked sheet strait. Watch the sheet go down the table, does it look like it is going strait?
Your sheet and fixed side guide must be flush. I got excellent results. The operators manual is correct. You must use the correct spring guides for perfect register. The manual recomends 1mm. push. But I use the same retainers on all weights. I found the super light ones un-helpful. I have never run onion paper.

 

[KPetrochko]

When everything is right mechanically, and there is a decent stock, I have seen these presses run 4 color process in 2 passes. For a pushguide press, that is impressive to me. The tech manual has some great timing info that I have had to refer to from time to time. A lot of techs dont just give out this info though. Go SLOWLY if you set them yourself. Much wackiness can occur if you skip steps. Lots of great advice above this reply, but bottom line..... the guy that sold this to you should hook you up with a little advice or check settings.... it only takes a few minutes for a good tech to verify timing if that is in fact a factor.

 

[pdan]

Other points - The bottom feed wheel, which the upper feed wheel comes down upon to forward the sheet. Place your finger (carefully, but it's common practice) on each seperate rubber area and inch, jog, or 1000 iph run the machine and evaluate their roundness. At perhaps, 10 million machine impressions, you're going to feel the going out of roundness, at 20 million, they're past their prime, at 30 million, replacing that roller solved all my verticle register problems.

 

[Richard]

3302 vertical register

3302 vertical register

After reading .. pdan.. reply, sheds light on the 25m impressions that I got.
A presstech guy mentioned that those lower feed rubber rollers could be a problem.
But also suggested to keep the upper feed roller away from the lower rollers as a kind of night latch, while the machine is idle.Trying to explain this to my boss is difficult. As the tech charges $250 hr. The combonation of the upper feed roller pressure, and proper slid wheel position and hopefully good lower feed rollers will asure perfect vertical register.

 

[Richard]

3302m register

3302m register

Oh by the way, I forgot to mention one other reason for up and down register movement.
very similar to what you described.
Each head, if you look, say at the second head with the gate open. The blanket cylinder, when you inch it around, you should see a nut. That 13mm nut when tightened will lock the cylinder so there can be no movement. The difficult thing is you must have the up-down hand control engaged. When you tighten the bolt, you must hold the knob at the same time. Once tight, the blanket cylinder will not move. There will be no movement.
So, what you do is tighten that nut, then back it off a little so that the op side control will move to make ajustment.
I once kept one head locked and ajusted the other head to it. You want both heads adjustable, and both holding the register.

 

[jimas67]

Thanks to everyone with their suggestions. I had the feeder wheels replaced and it registers like a charm. Believe it or not but I actually ran a 4 color 9x12 envelope on it. The colors were close to the middle of the envelope and I was allowed 500 over but I ran 5500 only lost around 250. I can post a pic if needed, if anyone is skeptical. Anyway thanks again everyone

 

[Richard]

feeder wheels

feeder wheels

Hi:
I am glad you got things under control.
The feeder wheels you had replaced, are they the ones (I think there 5 of them)
under neath the near the drum cylinder?
Your not talking about the 2 pull out rollers right?
I sugested that to you myself. I only wish I could convince my boss to replace mine.
How ever, he promised to get a Tech in. I have the same form rollers, they are 7 years old and still making good solid impressions. "If its not broke, don't fix it!"