Vertical Scratch Mystery Canon IPF8300 HELP!!

[StudioL]

We have had our printer for about a year and print mostly on breathing color vibrance rag paper which is thicker than watercolor or a Lexjet Fibre Gloss. All of a sudden we started getting these vertical scratches that are perpendicular to the direction of the printhead. We have done all of the usual checks and cleaning. We have played with media types, head heights and vacuum strengths and still nothing. The scratches tend to be on the left and right sides with less in the middle. They appear to match up with the spacers in between the rollers. It is not the paper as we have used the 24 inch rolls in a 6100 printer and it is fine. It seems that thicker paper will scratch and the thicker the paper the more defined the scratches. Watercolor paper prints fine.  

On a side note Canon has been absolutely no help to us because we do not use their paper. Their customer service is horrible! If you are using Canon equipment be prepared to use all of their other products too if you would like any sort of support or troubleshooting in the future. Our warranty literally just ended when this happened but they told us even if it was covered under warranty they would not send a tech out unless it was their paper. You would think after having bought a ton of their equipment over the past 20+ years that they could work with us on this even a little bit right? Even Lex Jet is trying to help us and they just sell us ink.

Any feedback would be greatly appreciated!

[Darrel]

Try printing with the top cover open by jamming something to lock the cover open switches closed.  The thick paper may have too much curl and contact the top cover rollers.

[Czornyj]

I always had such issues with heavly curled papers - usually old, stored in warm, dry places or at the end of the roll, on the 2" cores etc. Using stronger vacuum had always resolved that problem.

[StudioL]

It seems that there is some theory to the paper being curled as cut sheets are sometimes better, but that still doesn't answer the question as to why it started happening all of a sudden. The paper hasn't changed.

[Jeff Magidson]

but that still doesn't answer the question as to why it started happening all of a sudden. The paper hasn't changed.

Perhaps changes in the heat / humidity of your environment. Paper is very malleable and subject to change. All printers have pretty tight tolerances in the paper path.
 

[mstevensphoto]

the paper will want to hold its curl more as you get further into a roll too.