What it takes to keep your Sato Mission Critical Barcode & Label Printer Running.

You run a very efficient operation. Your manufacturing operation is running effectively and production is on-time. Or, you run a high volume shipping operation with hundreds or thousands of items being shipped every day. You have spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on machines, conveyors, computers, and various other systems to insure that everything is running to schedule.

Then all of a sudden your barcode label printer goes down. You reach for a spare, and to your horror, you find that someone had forgot to get the spare fixed the last time it went down. Now what? Production may stop, shipments can’t go out, and management is screaming.
No one thinks much of label printers (unless they go down), but they are often weakest link in the total supply chain system within an organization. These small compact printers can cause major problems in any company. You may not have thought of it before, but barcode label printers need as much on-going service attention as a production machine, an automated conveyor system, or even a lift-truck. However, they rarely get that type of attention.
To help you keep your barcode label printers running at top efficiency and to help you at times avoid extra downtime, MIDCOM Data has complied a list of suggestions, and if implanted, may help reduce your outages considerably.

Why would a printer repair company try to help people avoid expensive service calls? Because we have always built our business on earning the trust of our clients and giving them the proper advise. If they can’t correct an outage on their printers themselves or with our assistance over the phone, they know firsthand that they can trust us and we find that our business has grown exponentially over the years with this business philosophy.
So here are some real-world ideas for you on keeping your thermal barcode label printers up and running.

1. One of the greatest failures occurring in thermal barcode label printers is due to the print heads not being cleaned regularly. A good rule of thumb is to clean the print head on each of your thermal printers every time you replace a ribbon or roll of paper. Follow the instructions in your manufacturer’s User Guide as to the type of solvent to be used.

2. A second area that needs regular cleaning on thermal printers is the platen roller. In thermal transfer printers, wax can build up on the platen rollers causing improper printing of barcodes.

3. A third area that can cause major service issues is dust residing on the Media Sensor. This is the mechanism that insures that the gap between the paper and the printhead remains constant. Most people purchase a bottle of “canned air” and simply give the media sensor a few quick blasts of air which usually will clear out any dust residue left over from the roll paper. You should consider doing this regularly, perhaps every time you change the ribbon or a roll of paper. It will only take a few seconds and it will insure more up-time.

4. A good rule of thumb, when purchasing new ribbons on thermal transfer printers, is to purchase a ribbon that is slightly larger than the actual labels that you are using. For instance, if the label that you are using is 4.1” in width, then you may want to consider purchasing ribbons that are 4.33” in width. This extra width will help keep more lubricant on the printhead and may help extend printhead life.

5. Be sure that you are not using low grade label paper if you are using Direct Thermal Printers. Often bargain priced rolls of paper are really not a “bargain”. Why? Because low grade paper often is more course and can cause more wear on the print heads. We have even seen situations as high as 50% more wear on the printhead. As you know print heads in thermal printers are expensive, sometimes running as much as $650.00 each. It may make sense to pay a little more for the paper, as it is a fraction of the cost compared to replacing print heads more often.

6. If you are using a ribbon in your thermal printer, be sure that it is good quality ribbon. Many lower cost ribbons are not manufactured to the exact wax and or resin specifications of your printer, and could cause wax build up on the platen. Wax build-up can cause poor print quality resulting in reliability issues in reading barcodes.

7. If you or your customers are experiencing an unusually high rate of barcode read failures, and you cannot figure why, another place to investigate is something you typically would even not think about.

These failures can be due to the barcode being scratched in either the handling of the item or during the shipment of the item. Certain formulations of wax and or wax/resin used on various labels, when coupled with certain grades of paper, will not really allow the barcode information to actually adhere securely to the label. When this occurs, the slightest scratch or even another item rubbing against the label could cause parts of the barcode to rub-off.

If you suspect this could be your problem with poor barcode reads, you should contact us immediately, and we can analyze your actual labels with a special electronic meter that will determine the actual adherence properties of the wax and/or resin “resiliency” to the label. You would be surprised how many issues we have been able to solve for our customers with this free test, often saving them thousands of dollars in penalty fees paid to their vendors for having non-compliant and readable barcodes.

8. If you use the same paper stock in the printer, printhead “calibration” probably will not be an issue. However, if you are using different types of paper, and if you are having print quality issues, you may want to look in your printers User Manual and follow their instructions on how to recalibrate your printer.

9. If are using a thermal printer that is not using a ribbon (typically called a Direct Thermal Printer vs. a Thermal Transfer Printer that does use ribbons), and if you are constantly having defective print heads, you may want to consider either changing printer to a Thermal Transfer Printer or to a more quality paper. A Thermal Transfer Printer, due to the ribbon, greatly extends the life of print heads in that the paper is not directly rubbing against the print head itself. The more course the paper rubbing directly against the print head, the more failures you will have.

10. Another area that can cause service issues with thermal printers is if the printer has a Cutter Option. You may want to check out your Users Manual to see how they suggest how you can perform your own PM on this option. Dust and residue and residue typically builds up on the cutter, and with a few simple swipes of a cloth, you may be able to save yourself downtime and the expense of having to call a service vendor.

11. If you feel you are burning out print heads too often, you may want to check your User Manual for the recommended heat and darkness settings for the print head. An incorrect selling often will reduce the print head life.

12. Should a problem arise and you cannot correct it yourself using some of the ideas presented above, please seriously consider a call to MIDCOM Data. For twenty-five years plus we have been helping companies throughout North America with affordable and reliable service. We have many different types of service plans including our fast Time & Material Service Express, our low-cost Annual Service Contracts, and/or our fast-turn-around Depot Repair. Many of our clients utilize a combination of our services.


We are prepared to assist you. By the way, we also service Laser, Dot-Matrix and Line Printers as well as HP DesignJet Plotters throughout the U.S. and Canada. MIDCOM Service Group (800) 643-2664 or www.MidcomData.com/service.htm.