Electronica

Markem-Imaje 9232 Briefing Note
Some recent competitive situations and access to publicly available service documentation has given us valuable information on the 9232. From these we have learnt the following: Fluids Consumption 1. MI claim makeup consumption “as low as 2.5ml/hour”. This is based upon their 9651 ink (ethanol) at temperatures under 10C so it is a nice headline but not a realisticscenario. Domino printers would be comparable so MI have no advantage here 2. MI often confuse the makeup situation by saying “Additive consumption can be reduced by up to 2.5ml/hour at 20C*”. This means that their previous products (9020/9030) use 8.9-9.7 ml/hour at 25C for MEK. This is more than Domino printers 3. Sometimes MI provide to the customer a very thorough table of makeup consumption.It shows the 9232’s makeup consumption is 5.3-6.1 ml/hour at 20C and 6.4-7.2 ml/hour at 25C for MEK. This is for a G head (70u) so the M head (50u) will be even higher than this. Domino’s A320i is significantly lower than this for both nozzle sizes 4. The 9232 has a screen under the Printing > History > Availability/Consumption menu that shows historic makeup usage. This data is captured bydefault for the first 6 months of the printer life. MI give a “makeup usage guarantee” that the consumption will be at or below the level shown in the table mentioned in #3. If not, the customer gets 4 boxes of makeup free of charge. Any requests under this offer have to be validated by MI using a data file from the printer 5. MI talk about “Sealed 0.8 litre cartridges”. The operator will need to touchthe 9232 printer more often than the A320i with its 0.825 litre ink cartridge and its 1.2 litre makeup cartridge

6. MI promote “90 million characters per litre”. This is based upon their 72u Ghead but printing 5 drop characters averaging 9 drops per character. This is a nice headline but the print quality will be poor. The manual states that the GHead can achieve 72 million lower casecharacters per litre. This is based on a 7 drop character with an average of 11 drops per character running at 64,343 Hz (this is calculated from the data published in the print capability brochure and allowing a generously low jet velocity of 20 m/s). We know that a typical 7 drop message will require 15 drops per character rather than 11. This means in reality that the printer will use significantlymore ink than MI claim pre-sale

Servicing and Warranty 7. MI tell the customer “Total cost of service parts over 5 years is £1,100”. MI state that just 2 ink/air filter kits (£85) and 2 pump kits (£500) will be needed over a 5 year period. They state the pump needs changing at 10,000 hours intervals. Ink/air filters change intervals are 18 months, 12 months, 18 months (alternating thereafter) 8.MI highlight “Maintenance intervals of 18 months”. Given that ink/air filters need to be changed at 18 and then 12 month intervals it is hard to see how this claim can be true 9. MI do not highlight to the customer the requirement to “flush the ink circuit” as part of a preventative maintenance routine. They state that it does need to be done for 2 weeks shutdowns, storage of the printer andtransportation. However, this flushing must have to be done at intervals as part of a PM routine (it’s an inkjet printer!) 10. MI talk about a “Full 18 month warranty”. This is clarified as being “subject to MI terms & conditions”. Looking into the detail shows the pump warranty to be limited to 10,000 hours for standard inks, 6,000 hours for pigmented inks. A customer running 24/7 will find that theirpump warranty will run out after 1.25 years (or 0.75 years for pigmented inks). Domino offers an unconditional warranty on all parts and labour whilst our pumps typically last the life of the printer

11. MI offer “Premium Service Agreements”. These are warranty extensions to either 36 or 60 months. These are only available at the time of machine purchase. List prices are £1,324 and £2,877...