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In general barcode printer repairs
and maintenance go hand in hand. The internal parts to a thermal barcode
printer get much more life with maintenance. The barcode printer is a
mechanical machine with electronic parts. As most people are aware, mechanical
parts fail at a much higher rate than electronic ones. What we find and replace
most are print heads, belts and rollers. The belts drive the rollers, the
rollers pull the material through the printer and the print head puts the image
on the label. Although the print head is electronic, it is also mechanical; the
material used in printing is directly contacted by the printhead.
To maintain a barcode printer and help prevent
repairs, you will need to keep the rollers clean; otherwise you will have your
material slip and get miss-registration issues and poor print quality. If you
keep your printhead clean, you will need less heat and pressure to ensure good
print quality. If you are able to keep these pieces clean, you are less likely
to get a “jam” in the printer, which would cause belt issues. Unfortunately
know one can tell you how often to clean these pieces as it is dependent on the
cleanliness of the material (dust free) and the amount of use you are giving the
printer. A good rule of thumb is to clean these pieces when you replace the
ribbon (if you are using in thermal transfer mode). Most manufacturers of
barcode printers recommend only using isopropyl alcohol to clean the pieces in
barcode machines.
In terms of warranties provided by the
manufacturer, most manufacturers will not warranty damage and abuse. The print
head is the most likely victim in this scenario and the roller the second. You
should not touch a thermal print head with your hands as they are sensitive to
the oil in your skin. Print heads are generally looked at under a microscope
looking for damage and abuse. With the Platen roller, it is good advice to not
use any cutting device (razor blade) around a rubber roller. They will not
warranty a roller that has been sliced up.
Many clients knowing the importance of getting
their product out the door know they must keep their barcode printer running and
put their equipment under some type of maintenance agreement. The two most
common agreements are onsite and Depot repair. With onsite a service technician
comes to you and performs any maintenance or repair at your location. With
depot repair, you would package the device and ship to a “depot” for the
maintenance or repair to be performed. In general onsite will be for mission
critical and depot for non mission critical and or a situation in which you may
have a spare device.
The most common reason we see barcode printer
repairs is miss-registration. Although there are many reasons, the maintenance
of the parts mentioned above is the most common. It is also important to know
how the “media” sensors work on your barcode printer, many are movable and have
two parts (upper and lower) and must be aligned together. It is also important
to know how to load your media correctly; if the media does not go through the
sensor path you will likely get some type of miss-registration error.
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