Digital BW, The Print

Hello Howard,

>>BTW, regarding cleaning cycles, I never turn the printer off because
>>it often does a cycle on power up.

>I'd been told by Epson tech a few years back that it was important
>to turn off the printer. They claimed that the heads were more likely
>to clog if the printer was left on for extended periods of time. Is
>this no longer true?  Have you had no such issue with your 2400 
>being left on?

I haven't had any negative experiences doing this with the 2400 so far
(7+ months now), and had equally good results doing that with my 2200
for 2 years, and that was with Eboni and various other MIS inks
installed.  It definitely saves money by avoiding cleaning cycles.  

The 2200 has a neat trick in that after changing a cart, instead of
pushing the ink button (which starts a cleaning cycle), turn the
printer off and then back on.  It will initialize without doing a
cleaning cycle.  Unfortunately the 2400 won't do this.  I went for
months without clogs, even when I was doing UT7 experiments and was
changing carts frequently.

Speaking of that, as Alan said, changing carts is often when clogs
happen.  I think most of these clogs are actually air traps, and I
found that if, after inserting a new cart, I let it sit for 5 or more
minutes before pushing the ink button (or turning it off/on), these
clogs are almost completely eliminated.  My theory is that it allows
the ink to settle down into the head.  


Regards,
Clayton