Puzzling maintenance cartridge problem on Epson 3880

[rebadurchee]

A message has appeared on my 3880's LCD and in Status Monitor on my screen saying my maintenance cartridge has to be replaced SOON.  It shows about 8% capacity left and that I can continue printing until the message says it must be replaced.

However, it won't print.  Nothing I do, from pressing the OK button on the printer or the Stop button on the Status monitor will convince the printer to print.  If I repeat my futile steps enough times the printer will start, but will only print about 1/2" of the photo and then eject the whole sheet, wasting some very good paper.

What am I doing wrong?  The Epson manual only tells me how to replace the cartridge, but I'd rather not until it is full.  Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,
Stilson

[Jager]

You could try reseating the maintenance cart.  But if it were me I'd just go ahead and replace it with a new one.  They're only about $20.

[BobShaw]

All of those percentages are just guesses based on prints done. They are not really accurate. It is just to let you know to get a new one for when it stops.
I just keep going until that happens.

Taking out and putting back will probably fix it for a short time.

[rebadurchee]

Thanks for the suggestions!  I figured out I was trying to save $3-4 at most by not just replacing it.  I could easily have ruined much more than that in paper trying to be cheap.  So I replaced the cartridge and now everything works fine.  I did notice, however, that a large swath of the maintenance cartridge did not have any ink in it at all.  Oh, well...