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Author Topic: Is clogging resolution dependent? (Epson Stylus Pro 4900)  (Read 2089 times)

andre_m

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Is clogging resolution dependent? (Epson Stylus Pro 4900)
« on: July 05, 2016, 05:25:51 pm »

Haven't heard or read about this behavior so I wanted to share my findings:
Sounds familiar: months ago printing a check pattern my 4900 showed up some clogging (C and VM).
Sometimes I abuse the Epson 4900 as an office printer using plain paper. Since office paper is cheap I played with the dialogs, printed some tests and found this:
Changing the output resolution from the default draft - 360 dpi (this is the resolution where my printer has problems) to fine - 720 dpi or higher helps.
Seems the Nozzle check of the Epson printer setup is also using 360dpi which is not helpful or representative for me printing photographs.

Since I noticed this I avoid the Epson nozzle check and print a little color pattern with a higher output resolution to test.
For me the Epson Stylus Pro 4900 is still a fine A2 printer.

André
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Wayne Fox

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Re: Is clogging resolution dependent? (Epson Stylus Pro 4900)
« Reply #1 on: July 06, 2016, 08:44:10 pm »

the printer head only has 360 nozzles per color.  to get 720 dpi, the printer will move the paper slightly and print another pass.  So no need for a 720 dpi “nozzle check”.

However, a nozzle check is certainly not sufficient ink to maintain the heads and printing a pattern that exercises all of the nozzles is a good idea.  Obviously the higher resolution you print the more the nozzles may get worked, although not sure 2880 will gain anything over 1440.

I’ve had many download a page I created several years ago and it’s worked for me quite well.  the pattern was something I tested quite a bit to try and make sure all nozzles get worked similarly to when printing photographs - Epson cleaning page If you do any serious nozzle cleans, especially a power clean, it is important to print something like this immediately after and before printing any nozzle checks.
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stockjock

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Re: Is clogging resolution dependent? (Epson Stylus Pro 4900)
« Reply #2 on: July 07, 2016, 02:57:33 am »

the printer head only has 360 nozzles per color.  to get 720 dpi, the printer will move the paper slightly and print another pass.  So no need for a 720 dpi “nozzle check”.

However, a nozzle check is certainly not sufficient ink to maintain the heads and printing a pattern that exercises all of the nozzles is a good idea.  Obviously the higher resolution you print the more the nozzles may get worked, although not sure 2880 will gain anything over 1440.

I’ve had many download a page I created several years ago and it’s worked for me quite well.  the pattern was something I tested quite a bit to try and make sure all nozzles get worked similarly to when printing photographs - Epson cleaning page If you do any serious nozzle cleans, especially a power clean, it is important to print something like this immediately after and before printing any nozzle checks.

I use Bill Atkinson's Fourteen Balls image for my print every two days to exercise my iPF8400.  No idea if it is better or worse than your image but it lacks orange which is not an ink color on the Canon printers and adds red and green which are.  The ink colors on the Canon printers match the colors on Fourteen Balls so I'm guessing it might be better for the iPFx400 series but I don't know that for a fact.

Here is a link to Fourteen Balls:

https://www.dropbox.com/sh/ka35g3gtyd10823/-FRLLos-8N/Fourteen%20Balls.tif

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Wayne Fox

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Re: Is clogging resolution dependent? (Epson Stylus Pro 4900)
« Reply #3 on: July 07, 2016, 05:45:38 pm »

I have bill’s files. I always thought they were a little too extreme in colors for this task and depending on which profile you use the results are extremely variable,  but I’m sure it  does force ink out of every nozzle which is the main objective. As you mentioned, my target specifically targeted Epson’s inkset that uses orange and green inks and I found I had to force more of those colors than I thought to get enough through those channels. It seems to work fine with other printers thought, the orange and green in the file just exercise a few of the colors a little more.

I messed with with my file quite a bit to try and use a similar amount of each color when it is printed. I used Epsons status page which shows ink consumed by color the last 9 or 10 jobs to try and fine tune it.  It’s not super accurate, but it does a fair job.

I assume Canon has a similar utility, but I haven’t used a canon printer in such a long time. I’ve always heard with a canon if you just leave the printer on it will do a pretty good job of keeping the nozzles clear. (I had good results with that when I was using an ipf6100)  Power consumption when left on is minimal, maybe even less than the power up requirements every couple of days. But heads are expensive on the Canon, and they eventually will die ... and will do so much faster if not cared for.  Kudos for recognizing that and trying to take care of them.
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Ferp

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Re: Is clogging resolution dependent? (Epson Stylus Pro 4900)
« Reply #4 on: July 08, 2016, 07:34:54 pm »

For those with Epson printers, it is possible to use QuadtoneRIP in calibration mode to print out a calibration purge pattern that has eight or ten bars of columns, one for each channel.  Being a RIP, it can target individual ink channels in a way that you can't via the driver.  This guarantees that each channel and each nozzle is exercised fully.  You can print it at 720 or 1440 (or 2800 on some printers).  QTRGui on Windows can be a bit funky with the ten ink printers, although I think this should still work.  The advantage of this approach is that it may detect misfiring nozzles that are hard to see with the naked eye in a nozzle check, since each column in the print comes from one channel.
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andre_m

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Re: Is clogging resolution dependent? (Epson Stylus Pro 4900)
« Reply #5 on: July 10, 2016, 10:26:39 am »

Since the green and the orange inks got empty and I had to print many pictures the last days finally I did an all colors power clean, which was successful. The hygrometer shows 65,5%.

Thank you Wayne and all others for the test images and forcing me to insist to solve a problem I've thought I have not.



André
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