We are looking at getting a Durst 600 flatbed. Is anyone else running on of these machines. Just wanted to know pro's cons. We currently have a Seiko 100s for solvent printing and the quality from that is very good so would like to also know quality output comparisons.
Why Durst? How about a Vutek? I believe the six colour + white 200/600 is just an awesome machine. I think that Durst doesn't offer six colours in any of their machines.
Question is - what is it that you really wanna print on such a flatbed?
We heard Durst was the best and we are trying to keep at the high end in this competitive market. We have a Seiko 100s for solvent and want the best in flatbed.
We do a lot of work on colourbond, foamalux and melamine (coated timbers) and wish to print direct to these prodcuts.
Do you have a flatbed? What should we ask the sales people when looking at the machines?
Durst the best? Well... Not in my opinion. They still haven't produced a six colour machine. Their white ink is good, but Durst seem to talk a lot and target the high-end customer without actually having a real high-end machine.
The actually BEST as in MOST EXPENSIVE machines are the three brands: Inca (Sericol), 3M (Leggett & Platt etc.) and Luscher with their hugest flatbed in the world.
For me the flatbed that offers highest quality and best versatility is the Vutek 200/600 with all options. It can print fast if you need and then print slowly and with photographic quality if you want to. Durst does not offer anything that you could call photographic quality.
The Nur Tempo is great too, but you have to be sure that your Nur dealer in your area is a serious and decent person.
Another option that is interesting if you want good quality and large capacity is the Jeti 3150 UV. I'd give that a look and a thought if i were you.
I've seen and tested a very broad range of flatbeds and i still haven't bought any. I've tested the following: - Oce Arizona T220 UV - Zund 215 - Grapo Octopus - Neolt UVjet - Vutek 200/600 - Vutek 320/400 - Oce CS7070/MacDermid ColorSpan 72uvr Plus i've given a lot of attention to Zund 250 and Nur Tempo but i didn't have the opportunity to make my own tests.
The machines that offer good quality are insanely expensive and the ones that are not expensive have a lot of trouble. This is still a new technology. Maybe i'm a little spoiled because we're printing a lot of rigid materials with screen printing, with solvent and uv inks too. And i'm still not entirely satisfied with the results that you get with digital. I think that Vutek is probably what i would choose if i had to decide today.
"Durst doesn't offer six colours in any of their machines!"
Yes, but machine is workhorse 24/7 without any problems. Durst first offer white color for "non white" substrates, and white work like other colors (cmyk). I work on RHO 205W and 360 dpi is more than enough for photographic quality in large or wide format! Rho 600 is new version of Rho 205, only printheads are different (new version use arrays of heads- Durst quadro array and print in 600 dpi) and machine printing perfect and fast. On Durst you can print darker areas with higher speeds without banding problems. I am finished training course for Vutek 200/600 and machine is very bad - problems with banding in darker areas in higher speeds, very unstable software, and bad UV lamps. Durst offers High quality parts in a machine (Dr. Honle UV lamps, Omron Servos, a lot of parts are Made in Germany and Japan). Yes, Durst is an expensive machine but work fine and without "Vutek" problems. A vutek 200/600 print fine in lower speed modes, but if you want machine for real productions then use Durst!
I would like to know what were your experience with it a friend of mine is using it in Mumbai, India. The results are fabulous. He is practically printing on all rsurfaces like Acrylic, leather, Glass, PVC, Poly-carbonate, synthetic Wood, Cloth etc. possibly all things under sky.
aquasco wrote: "Durst doesn't offer six colours in any of their machines!"
Yes, but machine is workhorse 24/7 without any problems. Durst first offer white color for "non white" substrates, and white work like other colors (cmyk). I work on RHO 205W and 360 dpi is more than enough for photographic quality in large or wide format! Rho 600 is new version of Rho 205, only printheads are different (new version use arrays of heads- Durst quadro array and print in 600 dpi) and machine printing perfect and fast. On Durst you can print darker areas with higher speeds without banding problems. I am finished training course for Vutek 200/600 and machine is very bad - problems with banding in darker areas in higher speeds, very unstable software, and bad UV lamps. Durst offers High quality parts in a machine (Dr. Honle UV lamps, Omron Servos, a lot of parts are Made in Germany and Japan). Yes, Durst is an expensive machine but work fine and without "Vutek" problems. A vutek 200/600 print fine in lower speed modes, but if you want machine for real productions then use Durst!
Well, i can agree to those claims, but i've yet to see a machine that can provide me with the fine quality that i need. I'm not into printing large format on rigid materials. Usually it's up to 1m x 1m in my case now, so i need really high printing quality.
I have yet to test the Gandi 3150 machine with the 600 dpi heads. Should be a great machine, especially that you can swithc between 4 colours, 6, 8 or even 12 (theoretically) and they provide white and varnish, just like in case of Durst or Nur, as far as i know. I also know that Nur offers spot colours for their Tempo - that might be interesting. I'm a screen printer mainly, so this is a nice option for me.
Also today i received some backdoor info that HP Scitex is about to launch a few great UV machines this fall. They are supposed to be based on a 2nd generation of Aprion heads - if you know that, Aprions are responsible for the amazing speed and quality of the CORjet.
Well we made the plunge and the techs are here now installing our durst rho 600. will let you know how it goes. it is a fairly impressive piece of gear so far. am confused a bit about the colour matching profile and the computer for it as it is linux but have only had about 4 hours training so should get easier
Well i have been playing with our flatbed for a few months now. Great piece of gear. Still has that UV look. i.e dotty print but compared to older flatbeds it blows them out of the water. Very impressive printing direct to clear in reverse for backlit. The white options is also very cool and we managed to get the industrial version with a few extra features.
The option to upgrade the heads is a plus and one we might do once we need it to increase the speed. But the speed is pretty good even as it is.
