Is it OK to never (or only rarely) print using matte black (P800)?

[Jeffrey Saldinger]

Fabien (Reply 17 in this thread), thanks for the extra information and no, the weight was ok.  I appreciate your word of congratulations.

I felt ok about the weight before the purchase after all once I read the specs section of the P800 manual, which gave the weight as 42.9 pounds without the ink cartridges.  I knew from some work I had done a few months ago that that weight would be ok for me.  The new work area I set up is fine so far and I doubt at this point that I’ll be moving the printer to another floor.

Some of the large prints on 22x17 paper have been delightful to see, but for now I remain (as I have been for years) more touched by the intimacy that is possible with smaller works.  The large prints are helpful, too (e.g., for checking on my Photoshop masking and cleaning up other imperfections in my image development), which I knew would be the case, having printed for that purpose on 22x17 paper elsewhere.

Thanks again for your thoughtful contributions to my deliberations.

[JonPB]

I vaguely remember having read several years ago that a forced black ink switch would be automatically triggered in case one of the black inks remained unused after 6 months of printer usage. Sadly, I can't retrieve the source of that information. Could someone with access to a maintenance manual of an older Epson printer confirm this?

From the Epson 3880 FAQ:

If my workflow never requires an ink change, will the black ink I don't use dry or clog the ink system?

No. The printer monitors ink changes, and if an ink change is not done within 6 months, the printer performs an ink change automatically to keep the ink flowing properly.

https://epson.com/faq/SPT_CA61201-VM~faq-149366

Cheers,
Jon

[BradSmith]

Jon,
Nice research!