Epson ink jet cleaning

By Russ White (Russ@smalldog.com)

The Epson printers have some of the best print quality in the industry, the photo quality output is truly impressive. However that quality output does bring with it some unusual idiosyncracies.

Epson's print heads are incorporated into the print carriage, instead of on the ink cartridge itself, like Hewlett Packard printers. The "Micro Piezo" printhead technology that Epson uses is more advanced than the older "Thermal Ink Jet" technology used by HP.

If you have an Epson printer and you leave it turned off for more than a couple of weeks, you run the risk of ink clogging in the printhead nozzles. Normally, a couple (1 to 5) cleaning cycles will clean the printhead, but if after 5 cleaning cycles the nozzles are still clogged, you'll have to get a little more extreme in the cleaning attempts.

The first thing to try is to power up the printer, let it go thru it's cleaning cycle, once you see the printhead move off the "Purge Unit" (the pumping mechanism the printhead sits on when it's turned off), unplug the printer, *VERY GENTLY* slide the printhead away from the purge unit. You'll either see 2 rubber "cups" or a foam pad (depending on model) stained with ink, this is the purge unit.

Take an eyedropper full of isopropyl alcohol and drip the alcohol into the cups/foam, then manually move the printhead back onto the purge unit, let it sit for around 10-15 minutes, then plug the printer back in, run another cleaning cycle, hopefully the alcohol will have dissolved the dried ink in the printhead nozzles.

Epson's ink is alcohol based, so the alcohol won't hurt the printheads. If using alcohol doesn't work, you can try the same trick with warm water. If neither of these work, you'll probably have to send the printer to an Epson service center for a printhead replacement.

To prevent clogged nozzles, make sure you turn your Epson printer on once a week and let it run through the head cleaning. Even if you don't use it regularly, you have to keep the ink moving to prevent clogs.