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Thermal Printer & Netduino print quality issue

netduino thermal printer quality

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#1 rabbitt

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Posted 28 April 2013 - 03:40 AM

Hey there,

 

I purchased a thermal printer from adafruit a while back, and set it up with my netduino (plus 2), only to find the quality of the prints were not of the standard I had been expecting. I tried to problem solve, but was using the code provided in the netduino toolbox by Stefan exactly as it is documented, so I contacted adafruit to have a replacement sent out under the assumption that it was a hardware issue, which they did. The quality of the prints from this second printer are no better than the first.

 

Examples and further detail can be seen here http://forums.adafru...=182822#p182822

 

As this seems now to be a netduino specific/setup issue, I thought I'd consult the netduino forums as the adafruit forums are more hardware/product specific and they seem more equipped to help out with arduino related stuff.

 

Has anyone run into this issue, and if so, anyone know how to solve? The quality of my prints don't even seem to match up with those of the example netduino setup found here: http://netmftoolbox....pported devices

 

Thanks for any help, have a good day



#2 ziggurat29

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Posted 28 April 2013 - 01:28 PM

I suspect that it is something other than the NP2, especially because these are not bitmaps but rather are text.  It either gets to the printer or it doesn't.  Now, if it was garbled text, that would be a different thing...  On the other hand, you mentioned in the linked-to article having fiddling with various heater settings, so maybe that botched it?  But truly, I would check:

 

*  is the power supply sufficient to handle the load of the thermal element printing?

*  is possibly even the paper itself not-so great?

 

But I would look at power supply first; what are specs?

 

As fate would have it, I have a thermal printer coming in sometime the next week or so, so I'll let you know if I have similar issues.  I think it might even be the same-ish one as the adafruit -- the Kashino CSN-A2.  That printer's manual claims it can take between 5 and 9V.  I wonder if putting in 9V would make the heater hotter?

 

-dave

 

PS  Also on p 3 of the manual they state

 

???????GB18030 ???????????????Printer control panel built-in GB18030 Chinese character, thoroughly remove the uncommon words of anguish

 

so maybe you need to either use only the common words of anguish, or just thoroughly remove anguish words altogether to be on the safe side.



#3 ziggurat29

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Posted 30 April 2013 - 03:57 AM

I did receive the printer today -- I am pretty sure its the same one; at least it looks the same.

I just got it so all I did was hook it up to my desktop over serial and send some text.  It printed acceptably well for a receipt printer.

I didn't have a bench power supply at the ready, but I did have a few regulated wall warts, so I did a couple quick tests with:

*  a 5V 2A -- worked as expected

*  a 7.5V 1A -- did not work; motor would not advance paper

*  a 9V 1A -- did not work; occasionally motor would advance paper, print was less-than-great

So, I think that this means that:

*  the power supply needs to be prepared to deliver some juicy impulse current

*  my regulated supplies rated at 1A were protecting themselves during impulse and hence the motor stalling when printing.

*  the printer's internal power circuitry is not sophisticated enough to swap voltage for current, so you need to be ready to deliver current -- extra voltage won't help

 

Anyway, so much for power supply; I'll try out the code library you used when I can get back to the bench....







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