Digital BW, The Print

Jim,

Thanks a lot for your thoughtful response. In a separate message on this 
forum I think I figured out what the problem might be. I don't know why 
it hadn't occurred to me earlier that this might be related to the 5 
sheets of HWTM passing thru the printer at once, and the probability of 
the head coming in contact with it... in any case, there's a photo shop 
near me that's authorized to repair epson printers, so I'm gonna dump it 
on them to try to figure out..

the 1280 is still under warranty, but that may be invalidated b/c I was 
using 3rd party inks.. oh well, the head's a gonner any way you slice 
it.. i think.

Thanks again,

Mike

jim hayes wrote:

> You don't mention using a CIS but carts. I really don't know what's
> wrong but I'm going to give give a flying guess, so take that as a
> disclaimer. Also, I never needed to clean my 1280 under head, but did
> have some practice on my 1160's:
>
> I've always felt that cleaning under the heads clears up blotting and
> more importantly, dirt/hairs/sludging ink. So when I don't see
> hairs/sludge on towel anymore, I stop. I always did the paper towel
> trick with Photo-Wipes btw, less likely to tear and less lint. And
> always with carts INSTALLED.
>
> I never considered the trick to clear up clogs, just misdirected
> nozzle firing under head, and sometimes, but not always: ink
> "spitting". Ink blobbing I learned, could be caused by other things.
>
> When I loaded my own carts for the 1280 with MIS hextones, I had
> problems when changing carts NOT related to dirty heads. INK SPITTING.
> I would only get this when installing fresh self- filled "vigin MIS"
> carts. It went away soon but created a mess. At least one other person
> had this experience I recall.
>
> This would not happen with a CIS, since you don't change carts (much).
> I was changing carts all the time on my 1280.
>
> My solution, immediately after installing carts and letting printer go
> through charging cycle, was to do three cleaning cycles in a row...I
> didn't even do nozzle checks- I had to minimise the time that carriage
> was over printing bed.
>
> After three cleaning cycles I then put a heavyweight matte paper in
> 1280 and printed a purge pattern. If it started to blob, I mean more
> than the paper could handle, usually at far end of a pass, I'd
> immediately cancel print, or in emergencies...pull plug...anything to
> get it to return to parking pad (of course I then plugged it back in
> and either turned off properly).
>
> I don't recall what I did if it blobbed up terribly on the purge
> print, after I got the head back- maybe run one more cleaning cycles
> or turn off for awhile. The three initial cycles usually got rid of
> the air in head that I theorised was causing the "spitting ink", and
> after the purge print I was just fine, or else the blobbing was modest
> and cleared up during purge print.
>
> If I was right in my theory, air in head causes ink spitting. So
> changing to a new non-Epson cart or leaving cart out for a time (? I
> never did this...) would cause head to spit out air+ink.
>
> So my wild idea is you don't have a dirty head-paper towel problem but
> air in head problem caused by new carts  and /or not having carts in
> place then installing new ones.
>
> Also, I might check your parking pad to see how gunked up it is. You
> can irrigate it with your favorite solution (Windex, Fantastik,
> 40%ethanol+60%distilled water), and soak up with a radio Shack foam
> pad...repeat until clean. The foam swab can also swab the pad rubber
> perimeter of gunk, to insure a better seal.
>
> Apologies for length, and remember, I repeat this is only a thought I
> had based on my own problems installing carts in 1280...and this was
> with the older MIS ink- a different animal.
>
> Jim Hayes
>
>
>
>
> --- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, "Ranyart"
> <dilcher@y...> wrote:
> > Looks like ink is bleeding out from the print heads.  Some people
> > encounter this when they have external ink wells that are raised up to
> > high.  Happened to me once.  Could this be the issue?
> >
> >
> > --- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, Mike Sommers
> > <mike@s...> wrote:
> > > Hiya Folks,
> > >
> > > Following some great advice from folks on this forum, I was able to
> > > temporarily clean up the mess on my 1280 print heads by placing a
> > > Windex-soaked paper towel under my heads, and running the carriage
> back
> > > and forth over the towel.
> > >
> > > Here's an example illustrating the kind of mess I'm talking about:
> > > http://www.sinfin.com/smudges.jpg
> > >
> > > I was very surprised at how much ink was under there. I actually
> > used up
> > > about 8 separate "Windex-soaked paper towel pads" before the
> amount of
> > > ink coming off the heads wasn't too bad. (I had removed the ink
> > > cartridges, by the way).
> > >
> > > After some windex to clean the parking pad, a good night's rest and a
> > > couple of nozzle cleanings the prints coming out of the 1280 were
> > > problem-free...
> > >
> > > until last night, the same pattern of blotches re-appeared.
> > >
> > > I've ordered a fresh set of UT-2 cartridges from MIS, in case they
> are
> > > involved in the problem, but I'm going to have to go back in there
> and
> > > clean out all the excess ink on the heads again.
> > >
> > > My question is... at what point do I stop moving the print head
> > carriage
> > > back and forth over the Windex-soaked paper towel pads? When there is
> > > absolutely zero ink showing up on the paper towels? or is it okay to
> > > stop when there is still a little bit of ink showing up on the paper
> > towels.
> > >
> > > I'm hoping that the next Windex treatment will be the last one for a
> > while.
> > >
> > > Thanks,
> > >
> > > Mike
>
>
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