Digital BW, The Print

Hello

Some time ago I was given a dried up Epson 800. With nothing to lose I
removed the heads and after soaking them in a 5mm deep pool of Isopropyl
alcohol for a few hours, put them in an ultrasonic cleaning bath (I use it
for mapping pens and lend it to friends for jewellery :-))

I also used a small syringe and some tubing to force alcohol through the
jets

After a few minutes of zapping in the bath, they were dried and put back in
the printer - and worked fine (and continue to do so)

Was I lucky that they still worked?
How robust are the heads?

There were no alignment problems afterwards, they seemed to fit back in very
positively.

bye for now   

Keith Cooper

I'm glad you got it to work. I also know that a similar procedure is 
outlined by a MIS customer on their site. Here is what I know, from an 
 Epson 760 tech repair manual:

Page 78 thru 88, roughly, are devoted to aligning/ realigning the 
printhead with special software, licensed only to Epson repair techs 
(I tried to buy a copy, then beg one<g>), and only running on Windows 
98 thru the LPT port. This is a signifigant fraction of the manual, 
which shows you how to take apart and build a 760 from pieces. BTW, 
the software is designed for not only the 760, but the 860 and the 
1160 as well.

You have to do something called a "Printhead Angular Adjustment" and a 
"Bidirectional Adjustment". If you install a new printhead, you also 
must do an "Initial Ink Charge" followed by inputting a "Printhead 
Voltage ID" into the software. If you remove more things like the 
carriage unit, there are more adjustments.

The software also lets you reset the waste-ink counter, which counts 
how many times the printer has gone thru cleaning cycles. After a very 
huge number, the printer is programed to disable itself. Not many 
people know this, so don't do excessive cleanings<g>

The software also can check info on the "USB ID" and "Market 
Destination". I think this latter keeps track of where the printer was 
orignally meant to be sold.

The alignments can be easily done with printouts, a screwdriver- but 
you need the software too. As to whether the alignments are really 
needed or not-you'd have to make up your own mind.
Jim H.  






--- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@y..., Keith Cooper 
<yahoogroups@n...> wrote:
> Hello
> 
> Some time ago I was given a dried up Epson 800. With nothing to lose 
I
> removed the heads and after soaking them in a 5mm deep pool of 
Isopropyl
> alcohol for a few hours, put them in an ultrasonic cleaning bath (I 
use it
> for mapping pens and lend it to friends for jewellery :-))
> 
> I also used a small syringe and some tubing to force alcohol through 
the
> jets
> 
> After a few minutes of zapping in the bath, they were dried and put 
back in
> the printer - and worked fine (and continue to do so)
> 
> Was I lucky that they still worked?
> How robust are the heads?
> 
> There were no alignment problems afterwards, they seemed to fit back 
in very

> positively.
> 
> bye for now   
> 
> Keith Cooper