3eBK Black - Not Working - Cleaned Head with Distilled Water - Perfect

[Nifty]

Hey All,

I got an email from a friend here on the forum wondering what was up because I hadn't posted in a while. He said, "Notice youre not about so much of late though Keeping busy?"

I replied,

"Man, Im really busy! Ive got a full time job (work really gets in the way of hobbies) and I commute 80 minutes each way. I also have a site that exploded with popularity over the past 4 months the forum has about 50 new members every day: www.BackYardChickens.com. Ive got the family (wife and two young girls) and a house with 32 years of deferred maintenance... but yea, other than those things Ive got oodles of time on my hands. I stop by the forum pretty often but dont post as much because I just dont print nearly as much as I use to (or would like to) and the refill system Im using is working well."

Well, I must not have knocked on wood because things got a bit sticky. Over the past 5 years I've refilled my carts right when the "low ink" warning first comes up. Well I put it off and put it off until the wife said, "You're printer isn't printing". I had yellow bone dry and the rest were pretty low except pigment black - 3eBK.

I refilled all of the carts except 3eBK and heard the cleaning cycle go once I closed the cover. I printed a check pattern and it looked terrible. I did a cleaning and all my colors looked perfect except black... not a single drop. I pulled the cart, blew into the maze and ink dropped out no problem. I did a few more cleanings and still nothing at all from the 3eBK!

I was getting impatient and decided to take some (relatively) drastic measures.

NOTE: I don't necessarily suggest this method, and have heard that you can short out the printhead. I've got a new backup so I wasn't terrible worried.

I pulled the printhead out of the printer and took it into the bathroom sink (the wife loves when I do this). I used a brand new syringe / needle and blew a bunch of distilled water to clean out the ports, screen, and around the nozzles. I then used my air compressor to GENTLY blow away as much water as I could off of the print head.

After letting the printhead air dry I put it into the printer, ran a cleaning cycle and printed a test patter.... PERFECT!!! Not a single blank bar, squiggly line or missing spit of ink... no problem at all!

 

[Smile]

When I refill my PGI black a printer with normal head it usually dries up, I should cover the nozzles with food tape or something.

To revive my head without "drastic measures" I use a Oxygen enriched water spray on the nozzles, just a tiny spray then wait until liquid enters the nozzles. You can see it soak into the head. Then install it into printer and perform cleaning procedure. Works every time. No more heavy cleaning or deep cleaning

Hope this helps someone.

 

[Ken_CW_Honolulu]

The distilled water/compressed air method for cleaning printhead nozzles is called atomization. The trick is to avoid pushing air through the nozzles and thus creating air blockage bubbles in the ink chambers/lines. It also helps to have a system that produces water droplets small enough to enter the microscopic nozzles (a droplet size of about 20 microns seems to do it).

If you DO make an air blockage by not being gentle enough, you'll have to suction that blockage out with an aspirator or other vacuum/sucking device. You will also have to endure the ignomy of actually "sucking" both literally and figuratively.

 

[Nifty]

hahahaha...

Yes, that entire process would completely "suck".