Digital BW, The Print

I have an Epson 1290 (1280 in the US) and am printing on Hahnemuehle 
Photo Rag 308 gsm paper.  Nice results.

I wanted to turn the paper around and print on the back - a caption 
with copyright notice etc, in 40% gray.

I got this working a few times but now the Epson refuses to load the 
paper to print on the reverse side.  It takes the paper in a couple 
of cm, clunks a few times, then spits the paper back into the 
feeding tray.

Bizarrely, it seems to load the paper with coated side up, but not 
with coated side down.  I can't see why this would be the case.  The 
paper looks pretty flat (ie not curled) as far as I can see.

Anyone won a fight with the Epson feeding mechanism, and care to 
share some secrets?

Alternatively, if I upgraded to an Epson 2100 which seems to have a 
manual flat paper feed, would that work better?