Roland VersaStudio 20" BN-20

[Highfly! 0]

Has anyone any knowledge or experience with this new printer? The size and price fits the kind of work I am doing but I have no idea how well it performs. I am also open to other suggestions as well.

Thanks!

[jfought 120]

get a sp300v it's better money spent in the long run

[grumpysod 1]

+ 1 with the sp300v

Grumpy

[Highfly! 0]

Thanks for your input. The size of the sp300v is way too big in relation to the kind of work I will be doing which is printing relative small vinyl decals and panels for toys. I need the ability to print on vinyl for a reasonable price. I have a cutter so just a good printer at around $10k will make sense to me.

Any other afforable ways to print on vinyl?

Thanks

MG

[jfought 120]

1. you can pick up a used one for around 7500-8000. trust me after people know you can print you will be asked to print a lot of stuff that the bn20 printer cannot print. also they do not make a wide varity of materials for that printer so you are stuck paying whatever they want. you can print stuff as small as 1/16 to 28" on the sp300v trust me you will not be mad about the purchase.
   

[welder.man 3]

I bought a BN-20 a few months ago, I have been happy with the purchase, I have already found jobs where a larger machine would have been better but most of my work is small decals and small runs.

We also have a Gerber edge and a Roland GX-24 and they all seem to complement each other very well.

I was told it was a very slow machine but once again it is fine for me, it is not unusual for the three machines to be running simultaneously.

If you have any questions you would like answered, feel free to ask away.

[BigR 0]

Can you provide me with an update on your Bn-20? I think printing on vinyl will be a great addition to my vinyl cutting. I'm trying to justify the $8500.00 price tag.

[welder.man 3]

bn-20 6 Months

I posted this a few weeks ago, but I thought some here might like to see it as well.

I bought a BN20 with the metallic ink option, it is in getting repaired at the moment as the pinch roller lever now will not lift or lower the rollers.

I have been asked by a few people what I think of the machine so far so I thought I would post my findings so far.

The so called easy media loading system I find to be a bit of a pain, It might be easier if the machine is on a stand but I have mine on a desktop.

I also have a lot of trouble when I print something with the crop marks take it out hang it to dry, laminate it reload it to cut, but I find 9 times from 10 the optical eye will not find the registration marks, So I have started printing a faint line just out side of the cut-line so if it will not find the registration marks I can trim around the faint line I printed, this gets very annoying and time consuming I have spoken to many different people about this but I have not been able to get it to work properly. I use the crop marks on my Roland GX24 all the time and it works fine.

The metallic ink is OK but the machine is very slow and the metallic prints need to be laminated or they will smudge.

I find the waste ink cartridge fills up very quickly I am about to put the third new one in and at around $70 they add up. Every time I turn it on it cleans itself if it I leave it on standby all the time and it cleans itself.

I see now it can print white how ever my Roland tech told me to change it to white would involve changing anything that the metallic ink ever touched so everything from the cartridge holder to the print head would need to be replaced. So it is not a realistic option for me.

The biggest thing I find to be a problem with is getting materials for it most of my suppliers will only sell me a full roll 1370mm wide and 50m long as the machine cannot support a 50m roll I have to not only get the roll cut into 500mm wide lengths but I also have to roll half onto a separate roll to make the 25m long, Some of my suppliers refuse to unroll and cut due to contaminates, So I am very limited with what I can buy and where I can buy if from, Here in Australia anyway

This printer has let opened up a whole new side to our business as I can now offer different types of printing, as a result our business has grown over the last 6 months and I am happy to say the little printed has almost paid for it's self already. I do wish in some ways I bought a larger machine but this one suits our needs very well.

I have also just bought a tee-shirt press as I was told this machine is perfect for printing transfers. I will post more as I experiment if anyone is interested.

This morning I upgraded versaworks and I now have a third print speed that can print faster with a DPI of 720 x 720, I will try it out when my printed returns.

Added today as I now have the printer back.

I now find with the faster print speed, draft 2 setting (versaworks software download) I can knock 10 minutes off a print job but the print is still very good.

The problem I had with the crop marks was I had the printer connected with a USB cable that was to long, I dropped it back to a shorter cable and no problem at all.

With the waste cartridge I bought a spare and now I just empty the used one and put in new wadding and sit it on the shelf, I just swap when full, works fine and I will not have to continue to purchase new waste cartridges.

Any questions please ask, and I will answer if I can.