Zebra R402 User Manual

Smart Label Printer and Encoder

User s

Guide

980389-001 Rev. A

Proprietary Statement

This manual contains proprietary information of Zebra Technologies Corporation. It is intended solely for the information and use of parties operating and maintaining the equipment described herein. Such proprietary information may not be used, reproduced, or disclosed to any other parties for any other purpose without the expressed written permission of Zebra Technologies Corporation.

Product Improvements

Continuous improvement of products is a policy of Zebra Technologies Corporation. All specifications and signs are subject to change without notice.

FCC Compliance Statement

NOTE: This equipment has been tested and found to comply with the limits for a Class B digital device, pursuant to Part 15 of the FCC Rules. These limits are designed to provide reasonable protection against harmful interference in a residential installation. This equipment generates, uses, and can radiate radio frequency energy and, if not installed and used in accordance with the instructions, may cause harmful interference to radio communications. However, there is no guarantee that the interference will not occur in a particular installation. If this equipment does cause harmful interference to radio or television reception, which can be determined by turning the equipment off and on, the user is encouraged to try to correct the interference by one or more of the following measures:

■

Reorient or relocate the receiving antenna.

■

Increase the separation between the equipment and the receiver.

■

Connect the equipment into an outlet on a circuit different than that to which the receiver is connected.

■

Consult the dealer or an experienced Radio/TV technician for help.

NOTE: This unit was tested with shielded cables on the peripheral devices. Shielded cables must be used with the unit to insure compliance.

“The user is cautioned that any changes or modifications not expressly approved by Zebra Technologies Corporation could void the user’s authority to operate the equipment.”

Liability Disclaimer

Zebra Technologies Corporation takes steps to assure that its published Engineering specifications and Manuals are correct; however, errors do occur. Zebra Technologies Corporation reserves the right to correct any such errors and disclaims liability resulting therefrom.

No Liability for Consequential Damage

In no event shall Zebra Technologies Corporation or anyone else involved in the creation, production, or delivery of the accompanying product (including hardware and software) be liable for any damages whatsoever (including, without limitation, damages for loss of business profits, business interruption, loss of business information, or other pecuniary loss) arising out of the use of or the results of use of or inability to use such product, even if Zebra Technologies Corporation has been advised of the possibility of such damages. Because some states do not allow the exclusion or limitation of liability for consequential or incidental damages, the above limitation may not apply to you.

Trademarks

The Zebra logo and the zebra head design are both registered trademarks and R402 is a service mark of ZIH Corp. Windows and MS-DOS are registered trademarks of Microsoft Corp. All other marks are trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective holders.

Copyrights

This copyrighted manual and the label printer described herein are owned by Zebra Technologies Corporation. All rights are reserved. Unauthorized reproduction of this manual or the software in the label printer may result in imprisonment of up to one year and fines of up to $10,000 (17 U.S.C.506). Copyright violators may be subject to civil liability.

Introduction

Hello! . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1

What’s in the Box?. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2

Inspecting the Printer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3

Opening the printer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3

Closing the printer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5

Reporting Damage. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6

Getting Started

Modes of Printing. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7

Attaching Power Supply . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8

Loading Roll Media . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9

Placing the Roll in the Media Compartment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9

Adjusting the Guides . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10

Using the Media Adapter Plates . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11

Loading Ribbon . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12

Install the Ribbon Supply Roll . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12

Install the Take-Up Core . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12

Attach and Tighten the Ribbon . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13

Auto Calibration. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14

Operator Controls . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15

Power Switch . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15

Feed Button . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15

Status Light . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15

Printing a Test Label . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16

Hooking Up the Printer and Computer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17

Parallel Interface Requirements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17

Interface Cable Requirements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17

Communicating with the Printer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18

Adjusting the Print Width . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18

Adjusting the Print Darkness . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18

Adjusting the Print Speed . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18

Operation & Options

Thermal Printing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19

Replacing Supplies. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20

Adding a New Transfer Ribbon . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20

Replacing a Partially Used Transfer Ribbon. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20

Printing in Peel-Mode . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21

Printing on Fan-Fold Media. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22

RFID Guidelines

Supported Transponders . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24

Texas Instruments Tag-it™ Transponders . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25

Philips I•Code Transponders . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26

Inside Technologies Picotag® Transponders . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27

ISO-15693 Transponders. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28

ZPL II Commands for RFID . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29

^WT – Write Tag. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29

^RT – Read Tag. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30

^RS – RFID Setup . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32

^RI – RFID Get Tag Unique ID . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33

Sample of RFID Programming . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34

Maintenance

Cleaning . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37

Lubrication. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37

Parts List . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38

Replacing the Print Head . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40

Removal. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40

Assembly . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41

Cleaning the Print Head. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41

Troubleshooting

Resolutions. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43

Print Quality Problems. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46

RFID Symptoms . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48

RFID tags generally not programmed . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48

VOID messages are printed across media. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48

Nothing is printed.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48

Manual Calibration . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49

Troubleshooting Tests . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50

Printing a Configuration Label . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50

Recalibration . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50

Resetting the Factory Default Values . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51

Communications Diagnostics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51

Feed Button Modes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52

Appendix

980389-001 Rev. A

Hello!

Introduction

This section describes what you get in your shipping box and provides an overview of printer parts. This section also has procedures that describe how to open and close the printer and report any problems.

Thank you for choosing the Zebra®R402™Printer, a high-quality thermal transfer on-demand printer with RFID capability manufactured by the industry leader in quality, service, and value—Zebra Technologies Corporation. For over 25 years, Zebra Technologies Corporation has provided customers with the highest caliber of products and support.

This manual provides all of the information you will need to operate your printer on a daily basis. RFID specific ZPL II commands are contained in this manual. To create label formats, refer to the ZPL II Programming Guide (part # 46530L). This guide is available by contacting your distributor or Zebra Technologies Corporation.

NOTE: Many printer settings may also be controlled by your printer’s

driver or label preparation software. Refer to the driver or software documentation for more information.

The Zebra R402 printer, when connected to a host computer, functions as a complete system for printing and encoding “smart” labels, tickets, and tags.

What’s in the Box?

Save the carton and all packing materials in case you need to ship or store the printer later. After unpacking, make sure you have all parts. Follow the procedures for inspecting the printer to familiarize yourself with printer parts so you can follow the instructions in this book.

Inspecting the Printer

Look at the outside of the printer and make sure that all parts are present.

Opening the printer

To access the media compartment, you must open the printer.

Pull the release levers towards you and lift the cover.

INSPECTING THE PRINTER (continued)

After opening the printer, check the media compartment.

Closing the printer

Hold the top cover and press the cover lock to release.

Lower the top cover. The ribbon carriage automatically folds up into place.

Press down until the cover snaps closed.

Reporting Damage

If you discover damage or missing parts:

■

Immediately notify and file a damage report with the shipping company.

Zebra Technologies Corporation is not responsible for any damage incurred during shipment of the printer and will not cover the repair of this damage under its warranty policy.

■

Keep the carton and all packing material for inspection.

■

Notify the authorized reseller

This section describes how to set up your printer for the first time and use the most common operating procedures for loading media in tear-off mode and loading ribbon.

Modes of Printing

You can operate this printer in two different modes: tear-off or peel-off.

■

Standard tear-off mode allows you to tear off each label (or a strip of labels) after it is printed.

■

In optional peel-off mode, the backing material is peeled away from the label as it is printed. After this label is removed, the next one is printed.

The printer typically uses roll media, but you can use fan-fold media as well.

For procedures to use optional modes and features, refer to the Operation and Options section.

Getting Started

Attaching Power Supply

Check the power supply to make certain it is appropriate for your input voltage.

Warning: Use the Zebra-supplied power supply that came

with your printer.

Never operate the printer and power supply in an area where they can get wet. Serious personal injury could result!

1. Make sure the power switch is in the off position (down).

2. The DC power supply has a barrel connector on one end that must be

inserted into the power supply receptacle on the back of the printer.

3. Insert the separate AC power cord into the power supply.

4. Plug the other end of the cord into an appropriate AC electrical outlet.

Power

Switch

Power

Supply

Receptacle

Barrel

Connector

Plug

Vari es b

Country

Power

Cord

Power

Supply

Loading Roll Media

When you load media, you must place the roll on the media hangers and then adjust the media guides.

Placing the Roll in the Media Compartment

Whether your roll media is inside or outside wound you load it into the printer the same way.

1. Open the printer. Remember that you need to pull the release levers toward the front of the printer.

2. Remove the outside length of media. During shipment, the roll may become dirty when handled or dusty when stored. Removing the outside length avoids dragging adhesive or dirty media between the print head and platen.

3. Separate and hold open the media hangers.

4. Orient the media roll so that its printing surface will be up as it passes over the platen.

5. Lower the roll between the hangers and close them onto the core.

Adjusting the Guides

The adjustable guides direct the media toward the platen and print head.

1. Open the media guides by turning the guide adjuster knob to the rear.

2. Thread the media through the guides.

3. Close the media guides by turning the guide adjuster knob to the front. They should just touch, but not restrict, the edges of the media.

4. Unless you need to load ribbon, close the top cover. Remember that you need to release the cover lock, lower the top cover, and press down until the latches snap into place.

Using the Optional Media Adapter Plates

If your media roll has a larger diameter core, you can use an accessory (part number 105810-002) to adapt the core to the media holders.

1. Note which position will fit the diameter of the roll core.

2. On the left side plate, align the pegs with the screws and use a small Phillips driver to tighten them.

3. On the right side plate, align the pegs with the screws and use a small Phillips driver to tighten them.

4. Align the plates so that the pegs hold the roll core and press together.

5. Place the roll into the media compartment.

Loading Ribbon

You must use thermal transfer media (accepts wax and/or resin transferred off a ribbon) when you use a ribbon. When loading ribbon, you install the supply and take-up rolls, then tighten the ribbon on the carriage.

Install the Ribbon Supply Roll

Before following these steps, prepare the ribbon by removing its wrapping and pulling its adhesive strip free.

1. Thread the ribbon through the carriage.

2. Press the right side onto the supply hub.

3. Align the notches on the left side and mount onto the spokes of the left hub.

Install the Take-Up Core

1. Press the right side onto the take-up hub.

2. Align the notches on the left side and mount onto the spokes of the left hub.

You can find your first ribbon take-up core in the packing box. Subsequently, use the empty supply core to take up the next roll of ribbon.

Attach and Tighten the Ribbon

You must align the ribbon so that it will be taken straight onto the core.

1. Attach the ribbon to the take up core. Use the adhesive strip on new rolls; otherwise, use tape.

2. Turn the ribbon take-up gear counter-clockwise (top moves toward rear) to remove slack from the ribbon.

3. Close the top cover. Remember that you need to release the cover lock, lower the top cover, and press down until the latches snap into place.

Auto Calibration

NOTE: If you are using pre-printed labels, pre-printed label backing, or

continuous media, see “Manual Calibration” on page 49.

An auto calibration is performed when the printer is turned on (if media is loaded) or after a media error is cleared. When it is auto calibrating, the printer sets the sensor levels for, and determines the length of, the label you are using.

If the status light flashes red, refer to “Manual Calibration” on page 49.

+ 50 hidden pages

Zebra R402 User Manual

Contents

Introduction

Getting Started