Digital BW, The Print

I have had similar problems with an 1160 and PiezoBW inks.  The one 
thing you didn't mention is whether you have cleaned the print head 
itself with windex and paper towels. 

This weekend I finally started getting some good prints with almost 
zero banding even under a loupe.  For what it's worth, here's what I 
did:

- roll up a paper towel HEAVILY soaked in windex under the print head 
track to physically clean off the accumulated ink and gunk from the 
print heads.  I did this multiple times until it the towel came away 
clean.
- roll up one last windex soaked towel under the print head.  left 
the print head positioned over it over night to "soak"
- also, with another windex soaked towel, LIGHTLY dabbed the excess 
ink off the ink parking pad and then soaked it with a bit of windex 
as well
- then, using cleaning cartridges, i ran about ten cleaning cycles 
over.  Five the first night, then five the next morning after letting 
the head reast over night on the windex soaked pad.
- then i recharged the heads with ink and let them sit a while longer 
to let the ink settle (no air bubbles).
- lastly, prior to printing with it again, i told the printer if it 
didn't work well this time it was going to be off to printer hell.  
Then I showed it that scene from office space where the guys take a 
baseball bat to the office laser printer just to drive home the point.

It's been working much better since then.  I may still need to have 
the heads replaced at some point though because it still periodically 
fails the nozzle check until I "excercise" it a bit.

js

--- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, "harry_saddler 
<hsaddler@p...>" <hsaddler@p...> wrote:
> Well, I'm stumped. I simply cannot produce an acceptable print with 
my
> CIS-converted Epson 1200 using MIS (original) 6-tone inks on Epson
> Archival Matte (or any paper, for that matter) with the Brandin
> curves/workflow. Why? 
> 
> Banding. I can't get rid of it. I've tried all the suggested
> procedures: cleaning cycles, repeated alignment cycles with the 
paper
> I'm printing with, thickness lever on both + and 0... it only gets
> worse, not better. Is this simply endemic to the 1200? Do I need the
> printhead aligned by an Epson shop? Do I need a new printhead? A new
> printer? (A new life?)
> 
> Also, is there a generally-accepted best choice of
> workflow/profile/etc for the 1200/MIS/EAM combo?
> 
> I'm about to switch back to silver, if it weren't for people saying
> things like "hey, this is even BETTER than silver". 
> 
> Ah, for the smell of fixer.
> 
> Harry