HPz3200 Reseat Printheads Problem

[William Chitham]

Morning all, hope everyone is full of good cheer and Easter eggs after the holiday.

My well used z3200 has failed with an error of incorrectly seated printheads. It started out rejecting MkR but when I went through thge reseat process it started randomly refusing any and all the heads. I'm guessing there is a communication breakdown between carriage and main brain, I'm hoping a replacement trailing ribbon cable will fix it but any ideas would be most welcome.

Thanks, William.

[Mark Lindquist]

William,
In terms of troubleshooting this issue, HP recommends re-cycling the printer with complete unplug then restart and initialization.
I would go one step further after checking to see that the ink heads are current and shut down and remove all the printheads, place them in a large freezer bag and vigorously shake them.  Check and clean the printhead carriage especially the contacts for the printheads in the carriage and on the printheads themselves.  Inspect all cables, clean wherever you can, then reinstall the printheads.  Allow the printer to align the printheads or perform a printhead alignment procedure from the front panel under image maintainence.

Try this first, before delving deeper into troubleshooting.  Shut down and restart at least twice.

-Mark

[William Chitham]

Thanks for the suggestions Mark, I've done most of them, particulalarly multiple restarts, power off etc, and contact cleaning. It is true that not all the printheads are current but that has been the case more or less continually in the years I've had the machine so I doubt that is the problem - it is rejecting new and old printheads alike. What is the thinking behind the shaking? I should say that this printer is used pretty much every day, I have an all service plot from Jan this year that shows 934944 cycles of component usage including the trailing cable, is this a lot? I seem to remember seeing an HP document listing the predicted service life of various components but I forget where.

William.

[Mark Lindquist]

What is the thinking behind the shaking? I should say that this printer is used pretty much every day, I have an all service plot from Jan this year that shows 934944 cycles of component usage including the trailing cable, is this a lot? I seem to remember seeing an HP document listing the predicted service life of various components but I forget where.
William.

If you shake the Print Heads, it stirs the inks up and helps to clear blockages.  I don't know about the predicted service life. 

After thinking about it, William, I'll bet you've got a bad carriage PCA.  Often this will be the cause of the printer rejecting print heads.

Again, check all the connections first, then I'd look into getting a carriage PCA.

You can get an OEM replacement for $67.72  >  HERE

Pretty sure that's what's going on, but of course without being there to see it, I could be wrong.

It's something you can replace yourself.

-Mark

William - here is an HP document that details a procedure that you could try first, before getting the PCA board.

HP DOCUMENT

If you have removed all the printheads as they discuss (even though the document is for the Z6100, it is still pertinent),
then perhaps move on to the PCA board....

[William Chitham]

If you shake the Print Heads, it stirs the inks up and helps to clear blockages.  I don't know about the predicted service life. 

After thinking about it, William, I'll bet you've got a bad carriage PCA.  Often this will be the cause of the printer rejecting print heads.

William - here is an HP document that details a procedure that you could try first, before getting the PCA board.

HP DOCUMENT

I found the service life prediction, it is in the HP service manual section on preventative maintainance. Apart from the cutter everything is supposed to be good for 3,000,000 cycles minimum so mine is just barely entering middle age.

I agree about the PCA, this afternoon I had an engineer over who was confident that the little used PCA from my old dead z3100 would be compatible, sadly it isn't so I ordered a new one today. I replaced the one in the z3100 myself a few years ago and posted some photos on the now defunct wiki. Did anyone ever retrieve the resources from that? I wouldn't mind seeing those photos now to jog the memory, I think you were smart to keep your notes on your own web space.

Anyway, fingers crossed the new bits will arrive tomorrow and the problem will be solved.

William.

[Mark Lindquist]

Glad the engineer concurred with my diagnosis.  Now when it doesn't fix it, it will be on him, LOL.

Hope it works out for you William.

No, the wiki never got migrated.  I tried, what can I say.

-Mark

[William Chitham]

Not very surprisingly the PCA from my old z3100 didn't work so I ordered a new carriage, complete apart from the spectro, from a very helpful man called Les at www.1stcall4service.com in Birmingham. £90 including next day delivery, banged it in yesterday and voila, printing again. I also put in a complete set of new printheads.

William.

[Mark Lindquist]

Not very surprisingly the PCA from my old z3100 didn't work so I ordered a new carriage, complete apart from the spectro, from a very helpful man called Les at www.1stcall4service.com in Birmingham. £90 including next day delivery, banged it in yesterday and voila, printing again. I also put in a complete set of new printheads.

William.

That's great William - that's a super price including shipping.  Glad to hear you're up and running again.

By any chance, did you think about replacing the carriage belt while you were going to have it open and the carriage out and freely accessible?

Don't know how long you've had it since the belt has been replaced, but the writing is always on the wall for it.

Nice to be printing again for sure.

-Mark

[William Chitham]

The belt started shredding last year so replaced it a couple of months ago. One thing I learned this time round is that you don't need to take off any of the top or back covers to work on the carriage and associated parts, just the end covers and the side plate at the left hand end of the carriage rail. You can disconnect the ink supply with the carriage over the service station, remove the clips from the tailing cable and out she comes. Bit more of a fiddle getting it back in but saves a lot of time, there are many screws in the top cover and ink tube guide rail.

William.

[Ernst Dinkla]

Not very surprisingly the PCA from my old z3100 didn't work so I ordered a new carriage, complete apart from the spectro, from a very helpful man called Les at www.1stcall4service.com in Birmingham. £90 including next day delivery, banged it in yesterday and voila, printing again. I also put in a complete set of new printheads.

William.

William, when my Z3200 showed a problem with the carriage board I ordered a new one (70 Euro if I recall it correctly), but on arrival I noticed it was the Z3100 version so did not use it and ordered the Z3200 version. It could be that the different red ink is making the difference between the two boards.

Met vriendelijke groet, Ernst

http://www.pigment-print.com/spectralplots/spectrumviz_1.htm
January 2016 update, 700+ inkjet media white spectral plots

[William Chitham]

William, when my Z3200 showed a problem with the carriage board I ordered a new one (70 Euro if I recall it correctly), but on arrival I noticed it was the Z3100 version so did not use it and ordered the Z3200 version. It could be that the different red ink is making the difference between the two boards.

Very probably, one would presume that board is there to manage the printheads but I wonder what functions it actually performs, whether it is much more than a glorified junction box between the trailing cable and the heads. It is certainly nerve wracking ordering HP parts since the part numbers on the components never seem to match the numbers you order.

William.