Clogged Epsons flushes like clappers.!

  • Thread starter Thread starter Davy
  • Start date Start date
D

Davy

Funny I just sort of hit on somethin'....

Anyone ever noticed that while they refused to print they still flus
like the clappers...... as though the nozzles are bone idle

If the nozzles are blocked how does the ink get out..?

Dav
 
Maybe the head excretes it through the overflow valves.

It's a compelling question to say the least

Now just imagine if a design could be conjured to route that non-printing
ink back to the ink cartridge instead of the waste pad.
Now we're talkin' conservation.
It's sounding more like Dune every second, as in saving one's water.
Art, are you ready to go into business?
 
Hi Jan
Yeah I know during the cleaning cycle or nozzle cleans the suction i
greater, but during printing the only force is gravity and th
enertia generated by the nozzles

If the nozzles are blocked you'd think it wouldn't draw ink during th
pumping process. If it's clogged how does the ink get out, that wa
the reason for the question, is that logical I ask...

The recycled ink, all the inks would have to be kept well apart an
thought would have to be given to the cleaning process

Bicycle ink thats what you want.....

Ah well.., thought you might have given me 1 out of 10 at least - fo
thinkin'

Dav
 
Guess what Jan....
HP do this with some of their new models, the ink that is used for cleaning
goes back to the tank. I have no idea how that is accomplished but it's a step
in the right direction.
Tony
 
I'm afraid HP already has the patent on this. It is indeed what some of
their printers do. They recirculate the ink to remove air bubble and to
limit waste of ink.

On thing of interest that Epson did. On the little Picturemate
4x6 printers, the waste ink is pumped into a spare chamber in the ink
cartridge and discarded when the cartridge runs low, somewhat like laser
toner cartridges do.

Art
 
Think using the waste to ink tank chamber was mentioned way before Th
Epson Picture mate came out, way back when I was 'clackin' about mi
C62 saga, not sure if HP was mentioned

Wonder how you can flush ink out of a print head and yet they won
print..

Dav
 
The ink on an Epson is "vacuumed" out of the head passively.

If the ink is indeed coming out that way, the head is obviously filled
with ink. However, the piezo elements could be bad, of it could have
bad logic circuits, or the head could even not be connected
electronically. Ink coming out of the head during cleaning just means
the fluid mechanics are "working".

Art
 
quote="Arthur Entlich"]The ink on an Epson i
"vacuumed" out of the head passively
If the ink is indeed coming out that way, the head is obviousl filled
with ink.
Click to expand...
Can appreciate there is more pressure from the pump than a prin
cycle
However, the piezo elements could be bad, of it could have
bad logic circuits, or the head could even not be connected
electronically
Click to expand...
Thats what I deduced when given thought
Ink coming out of the head during cleaning just means
the fluid mechanics are "working"
Click to expand...

You can see now what made me think about it, if it clogged i
shouldn't flush

Dav
 
I can completely understand what you mean. I'd still like to know how the
design works for how the ink is coming out of the head, but not through the
nozzles. How is the ink ' "vacuumed" passively '?

--
Jan Alter
(e-mail address removed)
or
(e-mail address removed)12.pa.us
Davy said:
quote="Arthur Entlich"]The ink on an Epson is
Click to expand...
"vacuumed" out of the head passively.
If the ink is indeed coming out that way, the head is obviously filled
with ink.
Click to expand...
Can appreciate there is more pressure from the pump than a print
cycle.
However, the piezo elements could be bad, of it could have
bad logic circuits, or the head could even not be connected
electronically.
Click to expand...
Thats what I deduced when given thought.
Ink coming out of the head during cleaning just means
the fluid mechanics are "working".
Click to expand...

You can see now what made me think about it, if it clogged it
shouldn't flush.

Davy
Click to expand...
 
My experience has been that ink or cleaning fluid can
flow through the head and jets, yet it still won't print.
Tested with a simple syphon; bottle on a shelf,
in-line flow indicator, and small bore rubber tubing
over the ink cartridge spike. Fluid flows drop by
drop, at about 20sec intervals.
Which leaves you with dead piezo elements,
(and it's unlikely that all would die at once),
or electronics, which is more likely if no jets
or colours print.
If it's head or electronics, then no amount
of cleaning or special techniques will fix it.
Design of Epson heads, as illustrated in
their service manuals, suggests that it is
a through path and that ink only comes out
when forced by the piezo element.
It looks like a simple chamber, piezo element
expands, ink is forced out through jet, ink
can't go back towards the cartridge because
of the reverse flow resistance.
Piezo shrinks and ink fills the chamber,
or rather the channel sice the chamber is a
channel feeding all the jets of the same
colour. There being a channel for each colour.
 
Arthur said:
The ink on an Epson is "vacuumed" out of the head passively.

If the ink is indeed coming out that way, the head is obviously filled
with ink. However, the piezo elements could be bad, of it could have
bad logic circuits, or the head could even not be connected
electronically. Ink coming out of the head during cleaning just means
the fluid mechanics are "working".
Click to expand...

OH BUT THEY LAST INDEFINATELY AS YOU SAY
HA HA HA HA
 
Yeap, you got it. Ink flow means at least some of the nozzles are clear.

Art
quote="Arthur Entlich"]The ink on an Epson is
Click to expand...

"vacuumed" out of the head passively.
If the ink is indeed coming out that way, the head is obviously
filled

with ink.
Click to expand...

Can appreciate there is more pressure from the pump than a print
cycle.
However, the piezo elements could be bad, of it could have
bad logic circuits, or the head could even not be connected
electronically.
Click to expand...

Thats what I deduced when given thought.
Ink coming out of the head during cleaning just means
the fluid mechanics are "working".
Click to expand...


You can see now what made me think about it, if it clogged it
shouldn't flush.

Davy
Click to expand...
 
I suspect I wasn't clear enough.

The vacuum process pulls the ink through the nozzles. They have to be
clear (at least some of them) for there to be ink showing up in the
cleaning station.

What I was saying is that if there is ink showing up there, and yet NO
ink is printing, then something else is going on with the head, not
(just a, or even a) clog.

Look to electronic failures if the nozzles don't put ink on the paper
when they provide ink to the cleaning station pads during cleaning cycles.

The one confusion is that people look at their ink monitors as they are
running cleaning cycles with a fully clogged head and assume that
because the levels are dropping that the ink is actually leaving the
cartridge. It isn't, and it adds insult to injury, because that ink,
while still in the cartridge becomes inaccessible unless you reset the chip.

That, to me is the ultimate insult to a clogged printer head... the
supposed cleaning cycles either actually waste all that ink down the
drain (all colors at once even if just one head needs clearing), or do
it virtually (still lost to most people who can't reset their printer
cartridges) AND the waste pad ink counter climbs, leading to a
"protection number reached" condition, requiring, in some cases, a reset
of the EPPROM (yeah, I know someone is lurching in the wings and going
to comment on that one)... all because the heads clogged due to a bad
design to begin with. This scenario has probably lead to numerous
printers going into the trash.

Art
 
Well,..(now in clog shock) I thought I had understood the process; but upon
your further explanation realize the sun does not travel around the Earth. I
had thought that the ink was actually leaving the head through some other
pathway,even when the jets were clogged; believing those little ink monitors
were even somewhat accurate, as the ink flushed or vacuumed out the head
into the waste pipe and down into the depths of the printer's belly.
Epson-nice printing- but I'm continuing to get exceptionally depressed by
this company for the deceipt of their waste of materials, manner in which
they tie the consumer to their ink, and poor design choices when they use
ink that prematurely kill their printers (Dura-brite ink). I am aware of the
work arounds to save the resources and money, as many of the folks in this
newsgroup are, but most Epson users are not. If they knew and understood
the whole story they might take the time to either write Epson, or their
legislators.
If I wrote to Epson and they actually gave me the number of cartridges
they sell each year I wonder what that number would be? And now, knowing
that on a clogged printer the ink actually never even leaves the head; how
many of those tossed cartridges are actually full, because the chip said it
was empty?
 
Have you seen this Jan

http://www.pcworld.com/news/article/0,aid,114590,00.as

Just a snippe
Quote-
The Stylus C84 on average stopped printing with 20 percent of th
Click to expand...
ink left in the cartridge, while the Canon i850 stopped printing wit
10 percent of the ink left. Canon says that it generally strives t
leave 6 percent of a cartridge's ink as a safety margin. Epso
doesn't disclose its target residual ink levels, nor will the compan
comment on why so high a proportion of the total ink is unused whe
printing stops. The other printers we tested gave low-ink message
but never stopped functioning (see the test report for details)
Unquote:

The reson for the flushing is to draw the heads through the nozzles
hoping to remove any dried ink

Sending the waste to the ink tank seems a good idea but do thin
recycling for printing will lead to further problems apart fro
clogging, contamination etc and printing wrong colours, you only nee
a minute blob to cause this

Guess they'll call it Bicycle ink...

Dav
 
I've been aware of Epson's 20% and you're out routine for some time. It
didn't bother me me so much because the Epson 740 and 880 machines that we'd
been using at school would use 3rd party cartridges that cost us $7 for a
set of black and color. It hurt a little more when we started running C-80
and C-82 machines, as they use individual 3rd party cartridges costing $5.
Still we could deal with that waste. However, when we bought 16 of the C-84
machines and 5 of 6 of them clogged within a year an a half, some of them
with original Epson cartridges that took the cake. As I open new C-84
machines now I install spongeless cartridges with dye base ink from MIS. The
first month running 3 of these machines has been good, with excellent print
quality of text, nice photo quality-for school, and despite the annoyance of
having to fill cartridges (the easiest fills I've ever done) I'm gratified
that there are chip resetters, little waste of ink and the hopefulness that
these machines will not have to be prematurely dumped because of the lousy
Dura-brite ink that Epson mis-designed for these printers.
 
Yes, Jan, and now you understand that in spite of my years of faithful
service to Epson owners, helping them to unclog and resurrect their
printers, why Epson won't even officially acknowledge my existence.
Simply put, I tell people the truth about their printers. And although
they are the only printers I own, in recent years, particularly, I
recommend many brands depending upon people's needs.

With Canon now offering pigment inkset for some of their printers,
should they prove to be reliable and relatively clog-free, I may be able
to offer people options even in that area.

Sadly, Epson, which was at one point one of the more innovative printer
manufacturers, and which was, at worse, neutral when it came to
environmental and consumer issues, has instead become another corporate
bad boy, both in their anti-consumer and anti-environmental designs.

Although I continue to support the products to help those who own them,
I am less willing to promote the brand.

Art
 
For what it is worth, Epson does have to be more careful that they ink
doesn't run out on the cartridges, because not only do they occasionally
suffer from air locks if allowed to go fully empty, but more
importantly, when the Durabrite inks dry out they can clog something
fierce, because they use a waterproof (when dry) resin as part of the
ink carrier. Properly cared for and used, the printer head shouldn't
clog, but certain circumstances an exacerbate clogs, such as very dry
environment, improperly sealing ink head capping, changing ink formulas
where OEM and 3rd party aren't fully compatible (rare but can occur)
etc.

I do think Epson printers tend to use up too much ink in cleaning
cycles, purgings, and leftover ink in the cartridge.

Art
 
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