We all want to make sure that we’re making our offices and homes more environmentally friendly. HP have been putting lots of measures in place to reduce the impact of their large format printers and ink cartridges on the environment.

Recycled Parts

Disposable plastic cartridges have been a major problem, with around a million of them thrown out per day in 2017.  Focusing on this problem has been a serious concern of the industry over the past decades. HP have developed an “eco-carton” cartridge in response to this. This design uses 100% recycled and recyclable cardboard containers, which can be recycled anywhere. Meanwhile, the inner bag is designed with up to 35% recycled plastic, which can be recycled for free with us.

In order to make sure that less are thrown out, cartridge size has also been increasing. HP have increased the capacity from 775ml to 1 litre, so that the components last longer and therefore need changing less often.

The large format printers themselves are now being designed more and more with recycled plastic. HP are designing printers with up to 37% recycled plastic in the parts, with up to 90% of the machine being recyclable when it comes to the end of its lifespan.

Meanwhile, the DesignJet Studio is net carbon-neutral, with each part of the lifecycle monitored from material extraction, transportation, usage, and end of service.

Certifications

Epeat is the leading ecolabel for technology products. A product rated by it is designed to reduce environmental impact not just when it runs, but throughout its entire life cycle, from design to recycling.

The organisation specifies 23 required criteria, and 28 additional optional criteria. They’re designed to show that a product is less toxic, longer lasting, easy to recycle, and more energy efficient.

Some of these industry-wide respected criteria are a lack of toxic substances, making sure that materials are recycled and recyclable, lifespan of the product, energy efficiency, and packaging design.

The HP Designjet T200 series is Gold rated, giving you peace of mind about its environmental credentials.

Tips

One great tip to manage paper waste is, before embarking on a long print run, to print one page first, in order to check your source file and your large format printer are both working properly.

Programs are now being included as part of the purchase of your large format printer in order to get the best out of them. These applications are simple to install and can be updated easily, in order to keep them compatible with the latest software in a fast-changing environment.

HP Click is designed to make printing fast, simple, and with a focus on reducing waste. With tools like auto-orientation, error checking, and an enhanced print preview, you’re much less likely to create waste and come up against errors that disrupt your workflow.

Attitudes are changing, and McKinsey research shows that sustainability is “highly important” for about 40 percent of European consumers. The large format printing industry has its part to play in meeting that need, with a greater focus on recycling and recyclability being put in across the systems lifecycle.

Get in touch with us at Design Supply to talk about how we can help your business achieve the lowest carbon footprint possible.

Delivering the best teaching experience at the right price is a priority for schools these days. By utilising large format printing, you can deliver fun, engaging lessons and boost the morale and engagement of your students.

Bringing a large format printer in-house is a cost-effective way of taking control of your lessons, decorating your environment, and giving you complete flexibility.

Visual Learning

A 2015 study found “creating creative posters for a lesson, discussion, or example as part of this lesson helps students develop their critical thinking skills”. Stock posters have been used in schools for years to deliver information in a fun and engaging way, and to brighten up the classroom environment.

However, if you want to truly increase the interest and retention of your students, then making custom visual aids is the best way to go. This will deliver the best pupil experience, cost savings and streamlined workflow over time, with the control given over to the teacher.

Some ideas include:

• Gold star charts tailored with each pupil’s name.
• Large maps for geography and history lessons, with relevant areas marked out.
• Design process graphics for tech classes specific to a project.
• Calendars in staff areas to plan lessons and timetabling.

These can all be made into templates, which can then be adapted term after term, therefore streamlining your workflow in future.

Promoting school events

Creating an amazing community spirit in your school is so important to inspire your students to do their best. When your school wins a sporting competition, puts on a brilliant play, or creates a brilliant project, you can commemorate the moment with a long-term display that will motivate your pupils for years to come.

By creating lively and exciting banners you can also promote upcoming events, with large format displays certain to grab the attention of your entire student body! Graphics printers allow you to create amazing quality, vibrant images to really show off what your school is capable of.

Cost Effectiveness

It’s never been easier to take control of your school’s environment. While in the past it may have been necessary to go to external companies and services to receive top quality printing, that’s no longer the case.

With the use of existing templates and easy to use programs, it’s a simple process to make stunning designs. You can customise your materials to make them specific to your school with just a few clicks. Canon PosterArtist (https://www.canon.co.uk/business/products/software/posterartist/) comes free with your large format printer, giving you the power and flexibility you need.

Rather than spending your budget outsourcing your operation to a printing company, you can dramatically increase your turnaround speed. No waiting and budgeting if something changes about an event, you can simply make the changes yourself and create a new batch.

Security

There’s no need to worry about your large format printer being misused. Modern machines come equipped with a range of security measures to make sure that only the right documents and right people are using them.

This includes a pin lock to make sure that only authorised people can use it. You can also see a full print history to check every document coming out of your large format printer. These measures make sure your investment is safe.

Design Supply and Service

Cut down on admin by using our Design Supply and Service, which is a cost-effective way of getting your paper and ink when you need it. It also tracks errors and maintenance, so you have peace of mind that everything’s taken care of.

Call Design Supply today to discuss your needs.

The Design Supply and Service for Canon imagePROGRAF large format printers is the cost-effective service based on your ink use, and frees you up to focus on the efficient running of your business.

With automatic ink replenishment, in-depth monitoring and the highest levels of support and maintenance, the Design Supply and Service is based on billing you for the millilitres of ink you use each month.

The printers are linked to a secure system, allowing the service state and usage to be remotely monitored. Whether you have one printer or an entire fleet across multiple sites, the system will alert us when your inks and maintenance cartridges are low so they can be automatically replenished.

The system also constantly monitors for errors and warnings and general service state, to allow fast diagnosis of problems and the scheduling of routine maintenance. Every fifteen minutes, we’ll receive information about the state of your devices. If there’s an error, a notification is sent to our support team. If you need any consumables, we’ll dispatch them with a next day service.

For construction companies, you’ll see a reduction in costs, due to predictable ink costs per millimetre used. In retail, you’ll see increased productivity because of the automatic maintenance and replenishment. For healthcare and other public services, you’ll benefit from the small amount of downtime and the proactive service and support.

In order to keep your peace of mind, you can use our secure portal to view key information regarding your large format printer. There, you’ll find the latest errors, warnings, ink levels, and top media.

In Short, Benefits include:

You pay only for the ink you’ve used.

Predictable costs, smooth cashflow

Automatic ink and maintenance cartridge replacement, no waiting, no paperwork, no downtime

Diagnosis and preventative maintenance

Contact us on 020 7842 1555 or sales@dev.designsupply.co.uk to discuss your needs further. We pride ourselves on always finding the right plan to fit your needs.

Canon imagePROGRAF printers are awesome, they’re easy to use and produce amazing prints. However, as with all large format printers, you may sometimes find that what they see on their screen, isn’t what comes out of the printer. Here some common reasons and fixes.

1: Check the paper profile

It’s very important to make sure you’ve chosen the correct ICC profile before printing. This profile contains the information that the printer needs to accurately place and reproduce the correct colours on different types of paper. Different medias also require different amounts of ink to reproduce accurate colours. The imagePROGRAF machines have Canon profiles built in, those for alternative brands of media can be supplied by the manufacturer and easily installed.

2: Calibrate the PC screen

It’s important to calibrate the PC monitor so that colours and tones are displayed correctly on the screen. This would normally be a job for a specialist, but you may choose to purchase equipment to do this yourself.

Once the screen is calibrated and the correct ICC is loaded and chosen, it’s still a good idea to Soft Proof the image to ensure the fix is successful and to get the best results every time.

Soft Proofing gives you the ability to see a simulation of how the image will look when printed based on your chosen media profile. Ensuring that the colours and tones will look the same on the paper as they do on the screen helps avoid wasted time and materials. Soft Proofing won’t cost a penny, as you can use Canon’s free Print Studio Pro or Professional Print & Layout software to achieve this.

3. The print head nozzles are blocked

Your large format printer will have a maintenance menu, from which you can print a nozzle test page. When looking at it closely, it should resemble the top image, with consistent lines, rather than a botched grid. If the grid isn’t properly printed, you’ll need to clean the heads. Start with the lightest cleaning setting to see if that works, then move up through the intensities to avoid wasting ink.

You can use our easy tool to find more ink here.

4. Spring clean the inside of your printer

Cleaning inside the top cover of your printer about once a month will prevent problems. If the underside of paper is dirty or you’ve recently used adhesive paper, then it’s a good idea to do some maintenance.

Do not use a dry cloth as it may create a static charge, but make sure to completely wring out a damp cloth. Do not use any rough materials that could scratch the surface.

Your device may come with a cleaning brush that’s best for when working with the internal components, and there could also be a Platen Cleaning mode to select in the maintenance screen that needs to be triggered first.

Sometimes preventative measures will avoid problems that need to be fixed later down the line.

In order to ensure your printer gives you what you need, first time, every time, the Canon imagePROGRAF range design team have certainly covered every angle.

Inkjet printers have been the industry standard since the end of the 2010s, due to their environmental footprint and cost-effectiveness.

The first inkjet printers were invented after it was found that applying heat to ink would cause droplets to fire out of a syringe. Cartridges were then created that would use electric current to generate a bubble, which would shoot a droplet out of the nozzle and onto the page. But things have come a long way since then!

How The imagePROGRAF Range Gets Perfect Results

The media roll is fixed into position on the spindle via the locking end caps, to ensure that the paper cannot move from side-to-side or spin independently as it’s fed through the paper path.

The printer will then automatically make sure that the media isn’t skewed or crooked as it feeds, keeping it absolutely flat thanks to the strong, but silent, vacuum that will suck the media to the printing platform.

The printhead ejects ink at roughly 30 million drops per second, and even at this incredible speed, every single drop is accounted for. If one drop fails to eject, the printer will immediately use a different nozzle to compensate for it so that every detail of your hard work is present on the paper.

Stability matters, you want every drop of ink to be placed where it should be. Under the shell, many models have a steel unibody construction that prevents the printer from oscillating or rocking as the printhead zips back and forth over the media.

The Canon imagePROGRAF TM-305 large format printer features the LUCIA TD 5-colour all pigment ink system which produces the sharpest, thinnest lines. It’s specifically designed for CAD, GIS, and Poster applications, a minimum line width of 0.02mm can be achieved with a range accuracy of +/- 0.01%. Considering a human hair is around 0.08mm, you can be certain that your prints are perfect.

All of this and more ensures that you receive pinpoint accuracy of the ink placement, resulting in the very best quality output possible.

Canon eService for imagePROGRAF printers, the cost-effective service based on the customer ink use, frees customers up to
focus on the efficient running of your business.

With automatic ink replenishment, in-depth monitoring and the highest levels of support and maintenance, imagePROGRAF
eService is based on billing you for for the millilitres of ink you use each month.

The printers are linked to a secure eService system, allowing the service state and usage to be remotely monitored. Whether
you have one printer or an entire fleet across multiple sites, the system will alert you when their inks and maintenance
cartridges are low so they can be automatically replenished.

The system also constantly monitors for errors and warnings and general service state, to allow fast diagnosis of problems
and the scheduling of routine maintenance.

Customer benefits include:
Pay only for the ink you have used
Predictable costs, smooth cashflow
Automatic ink and maintenance cartridge replacement, no waiting, no paperwork, no downtime
Diagnosis and preventative maintenance

Find our more here https://www.dev.designsupply.co.uk/design-supply-service/

As energy prices continue to rise, we’re all checking our consumption. Thankfully, the operating power of a Canon TM-200 printer is actually incredibly low, so large format printer owners can rest at ease when it comes to running costs.

For example, the operating power of the Canon TM-300 is just 69W or less. That’s only slightly more than the typical operating power consumption of a laptop computer, and around 10% of a typical domestic waffle iron. When in sleep/standby mode, (which is where printers tend to spend most of their time) the printer will consume only 3.6W, to ensure that its systems are up-to-date, primed, and ready to spring into action.

One thing to keep in mind that when the printer is set to OFF, it will still draw a small amount of power, around 0.3W. To completely shut it off, unplug it from the wall.

Let’s compare this to a model from 2003, the Canon W8200. This model consumed up to 160W during standard operation, and up to 30W while on standby mode. Keeping energy costs down has been a priority for the large format printer industry, to keep your bills low and to protect the environment.

Managing Your Device Effectively

One tip is to go into your devices settings and use the energy saving modes effectively. A sleep timer will specify the length of time until your device enteres sleep mode, if no operation is made. To go further, Auto Power Off will set the time until your device switches off once it’s gone into sleep mode.

Take these lower and lower until you find what’s right for your office. However, your unit will use some power to switch itself on and put itself into different modes, so if you bring them too low, you can end up using more energy by mistake.

The whole Canon imagePROGRAF range are incredibly energy efficient printers and are all Energy Star rated.

Customers are busy gearing up for the Christmas period, and whatever your line of business you will almost certainly want to make displays, posters and advertising items as noticeable as possible. And what better way than to create them all, quickly and easily, in-house with a Canon imagePROGRAF GP series printer and our free Canon PosterArtist software? Perhaps you would like to offer vibrantly coloured or personalised wrapping paper? The good news is that you can do that too!

The GP range are the world’s first Pantone licenced aqueous inkjet printers for Pastels & Neons. The GP-200 and GP-300 use 6 colours to deliver premium-quality prints that make a lasting impact with a newly developed fluorescent pink ink. The GP-2000 and 4000 use 11 colours to produce superior, wider gamut prints.

But what if you don’t want prints with neon colours or pastel shades? Not a problem. You can print in regular colours too…the choice is yours!

The new Canon GP series are the ideal machines for producing beautiful, eye-catching images on posters, backlit film, wrapping paper…you name it! The new ink set, including the Fluorescent Pink (FP), are all pigment based and therefore formulated to be highly water and UV resistant…however the FP ink is slightly less durable than the other colours, so just how long will the FP ink still give your print that wow factor?

The short answer is “much longer than you’re likely to need it!”

If you are in advertising, entertainment, hospitality, POS, education, etc. all of whom don’t see extreme longevity as a priority this should be music to your ears when we say that the neon colours will actually stay as vibrant as the day they were printed for up to 3 years or more in the right conditions. Far longer than it’s likely to be on show!

Even in a window display, in full sunshine, you can expect 6 months before any fades occur and reprinting may be necessary, but it’s more likely that you would have changed your offers, project or product focus long before that happens.

Make sure that you use genuine ink to get the best results. If you buy from Design Supply, you’ll see the hologram on the cartridge that tells you that it’s the real deal.

Printing on high quality paper will also give a layer of protection that will allow your prints to hold their quality for longer.

So if you need, low cost, high impact prints that can last for years, check out the new GP series. Don’t need neon? Simply turn off the FP ink or opt for any of the other models in the Canon imagePROGRAF range for prints that will last even longer.

If you need more information on the GP, TA, TM, TX or PRO series machines, please contact one our specialists here at Design Supply.

Canon Direct Print Plus is an awesome, time saving tool that allows you to quickly and easily batch print on your large format printer PDFs, HP/GL2 CAD files, TIFF and Jpg.

A “Shortcut Print” option enables you to set up basic ‘hot folders’ on your desktop to speed up your workflow by simply dropping your work into it. Once you move a file into the hot folder, Direct Print Plus will start to print them. Rather than hit print on every individual file, you can simply drag and drop!

Multiple folders can be created, each one with different output settings to make life even easier. What settings can you have?

You can set your hot folder to specific output sizes, print priority, color mode, print quality, rotation, positioning, borders and nesting.

This means that if you want one batch printing job for rough drafts of a lot of project, but another for posters you want distributing, that’s something you can set up and edit as you go.

Another great feature of Direct Print Plus is that you can save your printing history for an amount of time that suits you. Security concerns may mean you only want a small amount of history, but if you’re after added convienence, you can select jobs to print from that history.

And there’s no need to pay for a costly Postscript option either!

Direct Print Plus is FREE, just contact Design Supply for your copy.

Preparing your printer for a break is an often overlooked part of maintenance. If you don’t take the right steps, your inks could dry up and the parts could misalign.

Should I set my printer in standby mode or should I turn it off during holidays?

Ink circulation systems, print heads and heating / cooling systems are all intended to work practically “non-stop”. When printers are left idle or turned off for a long time, they may suffer damage.

Under normal circumstances solvent and UV printers will work fine if it has not been used for up to a week but it is frequently recommended to set the printer in sleep / standby mode and there are a few steps to follow. A correct shutdown will be more certain to lead to a successful restart and avoid wasteful costs.

1/ Clean your Large Format Printer

Clean and maintain your printer at regular intervals, take the time to clean, tidy and prepare your printer.

2/ Check Major Failure Points

Print heads and ink circulation systems: The main culprit of breakdowns is stagnant ink. Print heads and cap tops can foul, potentially causing head nozzles to clog or deflect, or ink accumulating in the head can get messy droplets of ink on your print material.

Filters and fans: Most printers have fans and filters to keep them cool, especially UV printers on the lamp housings. Keep them clean and replace them if even remotely suspect. If you are in a dusty environment, check the filters often and replace, even more often than you think they may need.

Rails and Carriage: Wipe the printer’s carriage rail with a soft cloth and follow the manufacturer’s recommendations to know which lubricant to use. A lot of carriage motion or Y-current errors disappear when the carriage is cleaned and oiled.

Inspect wiper for wear: Replace cleaning wipers when they are worn out or soaked in ink.

3/ Inspect the Ink System

Unless you’ve been advised to flush your printer, ensure your ink cartridges have enough ink to use to run through your shut down period. As long as there is enough ink in the printer it will clean itself and circulate the ink to keep it happy and healthy, it is also important to check the waste ink drainage and empty where required so it does not over flow.

In addition, you must ensure that the ink already installed has a shelf life that will exceed the duration of the shutdown. If not, consider replacing it before shutting down. This is because inks have been carefully developed to remain stable for a certain period, but not beyond. Remember that manufacturer and ink suppliers may not accept liability for inks that have passed this date and have caused damage.

If your large format printer uses white and metallic inks don’t forget to shake the cartridges at least once a week otherwise ink may settle out and coagulate.

4/ Enable Automatic Cleaning

Some devices may need manually printing a few meters of output every week to keep things flowing but – fortunately – most have automatic cleaning systems that work unattended. You could be advised to simply unplug and shut down. Switch your printer off in standby mode and let the system look after itself.

5/ Print Room

Extremes of temperature, dust and humidity can damage your equipment and consumables.

Too much humidity and your inks may not dry properly, and substrate may absorb humidity and cockle, causing printing issues and head strikes. Too little humidity and you may have static issues, which may lead to overspray or other printing problems, including data inaccuracies that will cause your printer to produce bad prints.

Generally, if you have to shut down for less than a week and you performed regular cleaning and maintenance, there is not much to worry about. But if for any reason your printer has to rest for a longer period and you cannot print at least a meter of output a week, we advise you follow the above to prepare your printer for the break.

Brrrrr…It’s starting to get chilly!

Time for a reminder that now is a good time to colour calibrate your large format printer, as all printers can be affected by changes in their environment. Changes such as seasonal temperature and humidity may cause the colour representation to change slightly.

We know how important it is for colour-critical customers to obtain the same fantastic results time after time, so there’s a very easy-to-use and clever colour calibration feature built into the Canon imagePROGRAF Pro-Series graphics machines to compensate for those changes.

Executing colour calibration from the printer control panel will print a test pattern, this is then automatically read by the printer sensor to instantly set the correct colour values.

It really couldn’t be easier. On the PRO Series for example, simply tap Maintenance on the LCD screen, then tap Colour Calibration and then Auto Adjust. Click Yes to confirm and watch it do its magic!

In just a few minutes, you can be sure that every print is as great looking as the first.

If you are looking for a new A1 printer to produce bright, eye-catching posters, photos and banners? Not sure if the Canon GP-200 or the HP Z6 is the printer for you?

Here are just a few things to consider.

1: Did you know that the HP Z6 cannot be used on a desktop? It has to be stand mounted, taking up valuable space.

2: Did you know that the GP-200 is 24% slimmer than the Z6? Making the GP-200 ideal for desktops or small office spaces.

3: Did you know that the newly developed Fluorescent Pink ink expands the colour gamut to create a whole range of eye-popping colours…not just pink! And with the ability to use Spot Colour on your creations you can highlight detail, draw focus to the message, and give every print that extra-positive “WOW” factor when it’s needed.

Neon isn’t the only option either, pastels are also a part of your available palette.

Canon imagePROGRAF GP series – Excitement in colour

The Remaining Media Estimation function on a Canon imagePROGRAF printer is a fantastic tool, it uses the media thickness and roll rotation to estimate how much media is left on the roll. If you don’t have enough on the roll to complete the print-run, it’ll tell you.

But we haven’t abandoned the older and highly accurate Barcode system of media management. Using this function, the remaining media amount is managed by printing a small barcode on the leading edge of the media when removing a roll. When you reload that media, the printer reads it, sets everything up accordingly and trims off the barcode. In addition, it also prints the information in plain text, very helpful when taking a part roll from the rack, you’ll know exactly what it is and how much is left before loading it.

So, whether you require an estimate or barcode for your remaining media, you can apply the management method that suits you and your printing environment.

When printing onto thicker medias using a Canon imagePROGRAF PRO series printer, some customers may experience thin lines on their image as the roll gets used up. This is generally due to the fact that the paper that’s closer to the central core has much more curl. This tight curl leads to resistance the pull of the platen vacuum that would normally keep the media absolutely flat, and therefore the printhead may start to brush the surface of the paper.

Thankfully this is rare, but if this does occur the good news is that your customer can remedy this incredibly easily by increasing the vacuum strength to pull the media flat again using the following simple steps.

In addition, the following process allows your customer to increase the head height to create more distance between the media and the print head.

Saving paper with a Canon Large Format Printer

A question from one of our customers! We get loads of these and it is all part of our commitment when you buy from us. How to save paper when printing with a large format printer?

“One of the draughtsmen seem to have it sussed you need to save & open drawings in the Adobe Acrobat format & you can print & resize a lot easier.

We are sent drawings from customers in PDF for A1 & A0 prints, but its extremely hard to get it to print just A1, as using A0 paper will create large amounts of waste.”

Our advice:

As he said it must be opened in Adobe PDF and not a PDF in a web browser.

The driver cannot communicate otherwise.

In terms of saving paper:

After they have selected A1 and landscape (printing from an 841mm roll)

Tick the box as below that says no spaces if it is printing a white space.

When printing a large number of documents, perhaps as a poster campaign or to send copies to multiple clients, print one as a test first to ensure that your equipment is functioning perfectly. There’s nothing worse than getting to the end of a long print run and finding out there’s been a fault with your large format printer.

During extended breaks, such as the holiday period, it’s common to accidentally waste rolls by storing them incorrectly. Make sure that you store them in a place which is cool and dry, and too much heat could cause crinkles and curls, which can lead to paper jams.

A cabinet which is conveniently placed close to the printer is a good investment, as it will stop moisture and dirt getting onto your rolls.

Dust reduction is an often overlooked part of large format printer maintenance. Keeping your machine as clean as possible will ensure that prints remain perfect every time.

The automatic cutting of certain medias, such as canvas, can result in dust and debris collecting inside any large format printer and lead to premature printhead failure.

One remedy was to manually cut the canvas and backlit film prints off the roll with scissors or a blade instead of using the machine’s inbuilt rotary cutter blade, another is to allow the printer to moisten the paper cutting area with ink to prevent dust being created, but ink is valuable stuff!

This was because large format printers used to house the cutter in the print head. This would cut down on the complexity of the machines.

A little known fact about the Canon imagePROGRAF PRO series of printers is that, rather than wasting ink, they have a separate carriage assembly for the cutter, this keeps cutting dust away from the print head while placing the actual cut closer to the paper exit point. No manual intervention, no wasted ink.

This design also benefits the drop placement accuracy of the head and no ink needs to be used to wet the cutting area, resulting in increased reliability, lower ink use and higher print quality.

Modern rotary cutters are significantly more effective than the various methods of yesteryear, and therefore can be relied upon to cut a range of materials with a minimum of wear and tear.

Too much dust in a machine can cause a variety of problems, including poor colour accuracy and blurry prints.

It’s important to use an anti-static brush or compressed air to regularly remove dirt. Many machines come with a cleaning device and a space to store it between uses.

Keep an eye on exposed areas such as fans, or any other areas which are open to the elements. Keep these clean in order to have the best air flow through the large format printer, or you can run into power problems.

Get in touch with us at Design Supply for more advice and to find the perfect printer for your specific application.

Once installed, relocating your large format printer has traditionally been a labour intensive and high waste exercise if the printer needs to be heavily tilted. This involved draining valuable ink from the printer’s system into the maintenance cartridge, thereby making it unusable and expensive! This would typically be the case when moving machines between sites, taking them up and down staircases and tilting them to a high degree to get around tight corners or into lifts.

Thankfully this practice is fast becoming a thing of the past thanks to the unique sub-tank and modular chassis system introduced into the Canon imagePROGRAF Pro-Series and TX series of Canon large format printers, potentially saving you hundreds, if not thousands of pounds over the life of your large format printer if a site relocation or two are required.

Design Supply’s trained technicians are able to help you by following a unique procedure that drains the full ink-lines back into the sub-tanks for later use, the sub-tanks can then be removed from the machine for transport. Once the printer has been placed in situ at it’s new location, the sub-tank assembly can be reconnected and the ink lines re-primed, ready to print…no mess, no hassle, no waste.

Customers often assume that in order to print A3 posters, that they need to manually feed single A3 cut sheets. If you have a lot of A3’s to print, this would a long and tiresome job, not to mention expensive. However, just as half A0 is A1, half A2 is A3…so you can actually print A3 from an A2 roll!

Printing A3 from an A2 roll is cheaper, faster and far more convenient than loading cut sheets.

Check out our A2 roll here.

Couple of tips for you, if you’re doing a print for the first time on a Canon TM-200 A1 printer or the Canon TM-300

Tick the box as below “preview before printing”

Will show exactly how your print is going to look on the roll.

Further down you can see on the tab “layout”

There’s box “no spaces at top or bottom”

Hitting this should stop extra paper being wasted when printing across the roll for a smaller size.

DS Matt polypropylene 205mic / 130gsm. Size 610mm X 4.5m  3″ core ( with core adaptor)

Canon TM- 200 or Canon TM-300 profile setting:

205mic  / 130sgsm Polyprop = if there is a dedicated Polypropylene setting then use that otherwise either Photo Satin, PVC banner  or Heavy weight coated

DS PE-coated Professional Universal Photo Satin 190gsm   50mm core. Size: 610mm x 4.5m  on 2” core

Canon TM- 200 or Canon TM-300 profile setting:

190gsm PhotoSatin = Photo Satin setting

DS Matt professional-grade high white coated paper 120gsm    610mm x 4.5m on 2″ core

Canon TM- 200 or Canon TM-300 profile setting:

120gsm Coated = Matt coated setting

Here are some tips on canvas printing on the Canon TM-200 and TM-300

This is an economical solution, so it takes some fiddling, but other clients of ours and our tests have delivered good results. The 12-colour option adds another £2K plus to costs hence why we find this solution fits clients looking for a good result with a smaller investment but it does need some playing around to achieve this.

Also – it is a good idea to not use the cutter that is on the printer but do a manual cut with a scalpel or something. Canvas is a tough material, and it will blunt the blade.

You can increase the carriage height, but we would not recommend, if the head is raised too high it creates ink mist and also affects print quality. We only suggest raising the head if it’s coming into contact with the media. Therefore, a Canvas weight about 300gsm requires more adjustments and not recommended but can be done.

It can be raised through the paper menu once the relevant paper type is selected.

There is no canvas option in the printer media list on the Canon TM-200  or GP-200/300 but you can use the media configuration tool to rename/add. We suggest you use the HW coated paper setting as that gets us good results.