Pages: 1 ... 60 61 [62] 63 64 ... 77   Go Down

Author Topic: Epson 7900 from the inside - out  (Read 1092488 times)

davidh202

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 662
Re: Epson 7900 from the inside - out
« Reply #1220 on: January 22, 2013, 10:50:59 am »

Doesn't anyone believe that the Epson design engineers would have thought that one out if it is so necessary to agitate the inks?
I think the simple act of turning on the machine, which pressurizes the carts, is enough to agitate the ink in the carts!
The ony recommendation from Epson is to use the carts up within 6 months of opening, and that probably has more to do with the carrier slowly evaporating and the pigment thickening,which is probably not a good thing.

David
Logged

Eric Gulbransen

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 300
  • never surrender
    • MYX900.com
Re: Epson 7900 from the inside - out
« Reply #1221 on: January 22, 2013, 11:00:40 am »

Last discovery before work - I took Alan's Glycerol mixed with distilled water and spread out a 6x6 puddle of it on the counter, in the sun.  Next to it I spread out a 6x6 puddle of water.  Two days later Alan's puddle is still wet.  The water's been gone since 30 minutes in.  My next experiment will be filling a spray bottle with this solution and spraying over the capping station before putting this 7900 to sleep for a week.  I wonder if there will be a difference in clogs..

Alan Goldhammer

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 4344
    • A Goldhammer Photography
Re: Epson 7900 from the inside - out
« Reply #1222 on: January 22, 2013, 01:44:01 pm »

Doesn't anyone believe that the Epson design engineers would have thought that one out if it is so necessary to agitate the inks?
I think the simple act of turning on the machine, which pressurizes the carts, is enough to agitate the ink in the carts!
The ony recommendation from Epson is to use the carts up within 6 months of opening, and that probably has more to do with the carrier slowly evaporating and the pigment thickening,which is probably not a good thing.

David
Doubtful.  the ink is contained within a collapsible bag within the hard plastic shell.  It's the only way that ink can flow.  A hard bottle won't work as the sides don't contract and a vacuum would form preventing ink flow.  Nothing should evaporate from an unopened cartridge (same reason why soda doesn't evaporate from an unopened container).

Alan
Logged

Ernst Dinkla

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 4005
Re: Epson 7900 from the inside - out
« Reply #1223 on: January 22, 2013, 01:48:33 pm »

Doesn't anyone believe that the Epson design engineers would have thought that one out if it is so necessary to agitate the inks?
I think the simple act of turning on the machine, which pressurizes the carts, is enough to agitate the ink in the carts!
The ony recommendation from Epson is to use the carts up within 6 months of opening, and that probably has more to do with the carrier slowly evaporating and the pigment thickening,which is probably not a good thing.

David

Keeping the pigment particles in suspension requires delicate formulations of the ink ingredients, the particle encapsulation, its polarity etc. Test involves storing the ink at higher temperatures, centrifuges etc. And yes I have seen yellow inks settle too.

The Epson ink pressure system is very passive on the ink content in the carts. The carts empty from the side of the cart too which does not create much flow in the cart either. HP carts empty at the bottom, the regular membrane pump activity there stirrs the ink at the right spot.

What Epson engineers should have thought about is open for discussion
and there will be patents they have to consider.

Ernst, op de lei getypt.
Logged

chaddro

  • Full Member
  • ***
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 113
Re: Epson 7900 from the inside - out
« Reply #1224 on: January 22, 2013, 04:17:45 pm »

http://zczy.en.alibaba.com/productgrouplist-214342460/Clean_fluid.html

Red and clear cleaning fluid source. Along with a bunch of other Epson parts as well.

The decryption cards look like a cool bit of something.

Larry,

I contacted this seller, and this is his response:

Product Name:Epson Original printhead clean liquid.
Volum:1000 ml
Unit price:45.00 usd/1000ml.
Color:Red/White.
Quantity:2pcs (1pcs white/1 pcs red).
Total Weight:2.5KGS
Shippment fee:60.00 usd by EMS. (5-7 days will arrive your hand).
Total amount:150.00 usd.
 
We haven't MSDS at head for these liquid.All of them are Original.Made in Japan
Epson company.
Logged

Larry Heath

  • Full Member
  • ***
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 227
Re: Epson 7900 from the inside - out
« Reply #1225 on: January 22, 2013, 06:30:04 pm »

Larry,

I contacted this seller, and this is his response:

Product Name:Epson Original printhead clean liquid.
Volum:1000 ml
Unit price:45.00 usd/1000ml.
Color:Red/White.
Quantity:2pcs (1pcs white/1 pcs red).
Total Weight:2.5KGS
Shippment fee:60.00 usd by EMS. (5-7 days will arrive your hand).
Total amount:150.00 usd.
 
We haven't MSDS at head for these liquid.All of them are Original.Made in Japan
Epson company.


Well I don’t know that $150 is outside of my budget, I can’t speak for others. Hell a couple of carts of ink are more than that.

I have had no problem dealing with these guys; I have purchased a number of things through them with no problems. Case in point 10 ink dampers for my old Pro 4000 printers showed up at my door this evening, $27, free shipping/Post, it took about 9 days from Beijing China.  Most of the stuff I have gotten from them has been free shipping/Post. I suspect the shipping cost of the cleaner is due to the hazardous nature of the materials. I ordered some Paper Cutters, Epson made in Japan, for my 9880 are $21 delivered. Got a USB digital microscope for $35.

Later Larry
Logged

Larry Heath

  • Full Member
  • ***
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 227
Re: Epson 7900 from the inside - out
« Reply #1226 on: January 22, 2013, 08:51:42 pm »

This is such a novel idea from our friends in Russia, that I just can't help but pass it along  :D

"According to my experience, come to the following: using COCA COLA fresh with a syringe gazom.Esli Epson shake the liquid gently to and fro on the dried up tsvetu.U HP and Canons easier, the cartridge or head put in a saucer of COCA COLA and wait about 5-10 Flushed minut.Zatem distsilirovkoy purged with compressed air contacts and try a test print to the printer - pohaya, cleaning of service a couple of times and back test.I so the circle goes well until pechat.Na Epson may need more than one day, such a procedure."

By the way, the last reply in the thread seems to indicate a 25% solution of the RED (6022802-00) in DI water.

http://forum.a3print.ru/index.php?showtopic=8444
Logged

Mark D Segal

  • Contributor
  • Sr. Member
  • *
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 12512
    • http://www.markdsegal.com
Re: Epson 7900 from the inside - out
« Reply #1227 on: January 22, 2013, 09:12:32 pm »

Larry,

It ain't that novel (wxcept in print here and there) - I was contemplating a tongue-in-cheek suggestion here quite a few posts back suggesting to try Coca-Cola, but I decided not to, because I didn't know how some folks would react to that - but the serious point of it is that Coca-Cola can dissolve quite a bit of stuff. I remember as a kid being told in school it could also dissolve your stomach lining, but I suspect that was a plant from the dental hygienists association who also warned us it would rot our teeth. So gheez, if it can do all that maybe it CAN dissolve some gummed-up ink, plus who knows what else in those printheads - there's the rub. :-) And if the guys at Epson thought Coke could do it, there'd be a brown bottle available from somewhere somehow.
Logged
Mark D Segal (formerly MarkDS)
Author: "Scanning Workflows with SilverFast 8....."

Eric Gulbransen

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 300
  • never surrender
    • MYX900.com
Re: Epson 7900 from the inside - out
« Reply #1228 on: January 22, 2013, 10:09:09 pm »

Has anyone mentioned soaking in, or with RED having adverse affects to the head if exposure was too long?  

Mind you the first fluid I tested was Acetone, because I wanted to see what would break first.  What broke was the glue holding the channel to the plastic framework of the head, and the glue that holds the channel faces on.  I also believe the clear floor of the chamber deck was melted a bit.  Valuable test.  From what I have heard about RED, what makes it dangerous is it's tendency to do the same thing Acetone did.  Just takes longer.  How much longer is the unanswered question.  

I have traced the breakdown of glue.  Typically when you remove the face of the channel, the underlying honeycomb surface of the piezoboard is clean and black in color.  But on a chamber that has been subject to aggressive chemicals, the honeycombs are no longer clean or black.  Whatever color ink that channel contains, it then mixes with the melting glue and leaves a mucky colored stain across the honeycomb surface.  Looks like it spreads like a virus.  Or an oil spill.  The width of the glued honeycomb area that keeps colors separate is substantial, if such a word even exists in the microscopic world of smallness.  So it is of course possible that part of this area could be compromised and the head still may work properly.  

I need more dead heads for testing.  It would be great to let a channel sit in RED for a few days or so, then do an autopsy on it to find out if the glues do indeed break down from exposure to RED.  Then I could test how long this breakdown takes.  I could positively  confirm this with testing.  I have ordered both RED and it's clear sister, last week.

Our problem is simple, we can only reach the ends of our clogs.  The body of our clogs are completely isolated from any cleaner we put in the channels.  All sides, top and bottom.  Our clogs are also isolated from the sucking force of pairs cleanings, and from the movement and firing of power cleanings.  Try too hard to fire those clogged chambers and your head goes fatal.  It's a conundrum, the likes of which I am about to go Medieval on tonight.  

This chemical warfare has me paranoid about dissolving glues, so I am going a different route temporarily - just so we know something else that doesn't work.  Chances are highly likely that I am about to supply my own self with another fatal head, in just a few hours.

Alan Goldhammer

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 4344
    • A Goldhammer Photography
Re: Epson 7900 from the inside - out
« Reply #1229 on: January 23, 2013, 10:34:19 am »

It's the dilute phosphoric acid in Coke that's the active ingredient (it's also what causes calcium leaching in teeth).  Again, it's not clear from a chemical perspective what the mode of action might be in cleaning Epson print heads.
Logged

Eric Gulbransen

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 300
  • never surrender
    • MYX900.com
Re: Epson 7900 from the inside - out
« Reply #1230 on: January 23, 2013, 12:03:01 pm »

I filled an ultrasonic cleaning tank with distilled water and 20% RED, plus a drop of Dawn for Alan.  I drew RED into each channel, then suspended the head via wires from above, so just the face of the head sat in the solution.  I was afraid of the head touching the machine in any way, even in a basket designed to hold parts in the machine, so I hung the head from the cabinet handle above.  Totally hi-tech.  I ran the ultrasonic cleaner for ten minutes.  It's not an aggressive machine.  I had already tested a few open channels in this machine and no damage done.  As I watched the head being vibrated you could see fluid movement coming from the tip of the nipples on each color, so there was definitely movement going on inside all of the channels.  Once done I drew the clear neutralizer up into each channel.  they all behaved the same.  I then let the head sit over night, just in case moisture from the ultrasonic process had gotten on the board inside the head.  This morning I filled each channel with ink, so as to avoid more and more and more cleanings to charge a head again.  It gets expensive all these tests..  Head was reccognized fine.  Printed fine.  But no change in green. 

This is not a good sign

davidh202

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 662
Re: Epson 7900 from the inside - out
« Reply #1231 on: January 23, 2013, 02:34:54 pm »

Eric,
How is the printer allowing you to proceed to print with bad nozzles-channels? doesn't it just continue to give you error messages to clean the offending nozzles-channels?
Are you doing this in serviceman mode?
Logged

Eric Gulbransen

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 300
  • never surrender
    • MYX900.com
Re: Epson 7900 from the inside - out
« Reply #1232 on: January 23, 2013, 08:43:00 pm »

You can't print with clogged nozzles David?  Maybe because I have auto cleanings turned off it's different for me.  I can definitely print with clogs.  Just doesn't look so good..  :)

davidh202

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 662
Re: Epson 7900 from the inside - out
« Reply #1233 on: January 23, 2013, 11:27:07 pm »

That's probably why.I have auto checks and clean on in the default setting (I think), of periodically.
If I get a "cleaning recommended" message from the auto nozzle check,  the machine will just keep giving me the error and won't print unless I choose to ignore it and choose 'proceed anyway'.
I will always clean at that point to prevent the possability of ruined prints ,banding, or possible further damage.
I figure the machine is smarter than me  ::), knows there is a problem, and I allow it to fix itself .
I really believe that these machines are somewhat self aware and better off allowed to do their own thing even if it wastes a little ink, instead of risking the possibility of fatal clogging;-)

David
« Last Edit: January 23, 2013, 11:29:52 pm by davidh202 »
Logged

Spocket

  • Newbie
  • *
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 1
Re: Epson 7900 from the inside - out
« Reply #1234 on: January 31, 2013, 02:02:19 am »

Hey Everybody

I've been following this thread for a while, and wonder why there is no activity anymore?? ;)

/Spock
Logged

Ernst Dinkla

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 4005
Re: Epson 7900 from the inside - out
« Reply #1235 on: January 31, 2013, 05:25:23 am »

Hey Everybody

I've been following this thread for a while, and wonder why there is no activity anymore?? ;)

/Spock

It could not be a lack of clogged heads to experiment with one would think. Not to mention odd solvents.

--
Met vriendelijke groet, Ernst

http://www.pigment-print.com/spectralplots/spectrumviz_1.htm
December 2012, 500+ inkjet media white spectral plots.

Logged

Denniswcr

  • Newbie
  • *
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 28
Re: Epson 7900 from the inside - out
« Reply #1236 on: January 31, 2013, 11:08:23 am »

Eric is probably doing some heavy thinking.
Logged

Eric Gulbransen

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 300
  • never surrender
    • MYX900.com
Re: Epson 7900 from the inside - out
« Reply #1237 on: January 31, 2013, 11:39:14 am »

Thanks for the poke(s).

Truth is I screwed up, and I'm really bummed about it.  That's why the quiet.  I grew up reading a poem my mom hung on our wall.  You all know it too.  Something about two roads diverging in a wood, and me taking the one less traveled.  Sometimes I love her for that poem, other times I wish I grew up illiterate.  I've been a builder since my early 20s.  That means five days a week I walk through life solving problems with the 28oz framing hammer hanging inches from my finger tips.  That's the good side of being a builder.  The bad side is seven days a week I walk through life feeling I can solve problems by smashing them.  

I am much better now.  Rarely am I bit by the smash it monster.  But I lost it in that last experiment.  Truth is I only told half the story.  What really happened is worse...

I took the dead green head, filled it with RED, sat it's face in the ultrasonic cleaner, ran it for a while, rinsed it, then installed it.  Everything went fine.  Machine recognized it, set itself back up and was ready to print.  Typically I do pairs cleanings to get ink in the head again, in service mode, which I did this time as well.  I was anxious to see results.  More than usual actually.  In fact this time I was sure there would be a difference.  I didn't know what that difference would be of course, I just knew it would be.  Then the machine stopped me - it asked for another maintenance tank before it could do the pairs cleaning.  As you might imagine, I face this challenge regularly.  Once I worked my way past the maintenance tank warning I was greeted by an LLK cart stop.  I keep one spare of each color so this was not a problem.  ...Until the machine couldn't recognize the new Epson cart.  WTF.  This took some scavenging but finally I robbed a cart with enough ink left to do the pairs cleaning.  ...then I got a Cyan stop.  WTF, again..  I put my new Cyan cart in the machine and got my second cart failure message in the same night.  Can't be I thought, so I put the new cart in my 7900.  Same message.  This really pissed me off, because I don't have any Cyan carts to scavenge for.  So the test is over, just inches from the result I've been working toward for over a year now.  You don't even want to know what that felt like.  I definitely didn't.  

Enter, the framing hammer.

I pulled the head, forced Cyan ink (that I had pulled from an "empty" cart last month) into each channel, then re-installed the head.  I knew under service mode I could force my way past the unavoidable cleanings in regular mode, but I also knew I couldn't print a nozzle pattern.  I created a full page 8x10 doc in photoshop, with vertical bands of enough different colors and shades that for sure each channel would be fired.  This would be my nozzle check.  All bands would be Cyan of course, but at the very least I could tell, tonight, if any of the "green" nozzles were firing.  Genius right?  Yea, no.  Not genius.  Let me tell you something about service mode which you might not know - it's a LOT like walking through life, after work, with your 28oz framing hammer still hanging inches from your finger tips.  Yes you can swap PK for MK in service mode, and yes you can avoid the unavoidable cleanings that regular mode forces the machine to run.  Yes you can print in service mode too.  You can do a lot of things in service mode that you can't do in regular mode - including even forcing your way past some menu stops which would otherwise dead-end you.  That kind of makes you feel like you're smarter than the machine, after a while.  Trust me you are not.  In regular mode the machine steps in, kind of like a big brother.  It warns you of things, it reminds you of things, and most importantly it stops you when you should probably be stopped.

I clicked "print".  The machine went to work.  Everything was Cyan.  Bands grew from page bottom like the dream I've longed for.  I watched the first inch with a big smile.  Mind a few drop outs (with no cleanings yet) it seemed my plan was working.  I was confident that at least some of the green nozzles had been rescued from their mummified tombs.  Now I'd let it fill the page with Cyan.  Eventually each channel's true colors would begin to show, but for now I didn't care about color - just nozzles firing.  With 3/4 of the page printed, suddenly everything stopped dead in it's tracks.  A fatal error message flashed across the menu, reading:



- - - This is Japan - - -

- - - Don't look surprised - - -



- - - You knew we were coming - - -



- - - This is no place for you - - -

- - - nor for your hammer - - -



- - - Go home now - - -

- - - and take your fatal error head with you - - -




All air left, my sails went limp.  I shut the machine off and went to bed.  Next morning I strapped on my belt, slid my hammer through the loop, and dove back into a world where I belong.


Since then I've got a few emails, "What's up?  What happened?"  I even got a "Don't give up".
This morning I pulled that print from the machine.  I think now all nozzles did actually fire, at least at the beginning of the print, but slowly it seems most all of the channels ran dry of ink.  The cyan bands get lighter and lighter with each pass that the head made.  After about six inches of printing at least two went completely dry, which I assume is when the head overheated.  I doubt in regular mode this would ever have happened.  Instead the machine would have stopped itself with a menu warning.

So I blew it.  But at the same time, I think I might have solved it.  I won't know until I get another head, and try again.
« Last Edit: January 31, 2013, 10:32:39 pm by Eric Gulbransen »
Logged

Mark D Segal

  • Contributor
  • Sr. Member
  • *
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 12512
    • http://www.markdsegal.com
Re: Epson 7900 from the inside - out
« Reply #1238 on: January 31, 2013, 01:43:53 pm »

This is very poetic Eric. It's a great read and I think you would make a wonderful author if you don't end-up cutting it as an expert on making Epson print-heads behave like the proverbial cat with nine lives. I also admire your persistence. I would have given up a multitude of pages ago. That head is probably totally fried by now - if indeed you have broken through all the protections the firmware has built-in to prevent those things from happening. I'd like to recommend a slight re-orientation of your research: the extent of the original green blockage in that head may have been at the extreme end of anything anyone could ever encounter - who knows, maybe 0.1% of total 7900s out there. The more interesting cases are the ones that are "seriously clogged but not irreparably so" because those would represent a somewhat higher percentage of 7900s out there, the people who own them have a serious interest in fixes that go beyond what the manual in all its conservatism (for good legal reasons) tells them to do, and they don't have access to ready service at an affordable price. So if you can attract into your "lab" several printheads that fall into this category and see whether any of the concoctions and techniques you've tried actually do clear them, you'd have a big achievement under your belt.
Logged
Mark D Segal (formerly MarkDS)
Author: "Scanning Workflows with SilverFast 8....."

sfblue

  • Jr. Member
  • **
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 63
    • http://
Re: Epson 7900 from the inside - out
« Reply #1239 on: January 31, 2013, 06:23:45 pm »

Epson Haiku:

Inspiring Prints
Cleaning cycles be d*mned, 'til
Fatal Head Error

Eric-- even though I've moved on to the Canon 8400 and am quite happy, I'll reiterate a previous thought:  for me, the long-lasting impact of this thread isn't going to be decided by whether or not there is a universal solvent and method to unclog permanently clogged heads.  It's that you've already done a huge amount to help a community of people understand their printers-- including maintenance that can help us avoid that dark place of perpetual clogging in the first place.  I bet we all could put together a one page summary of printer maintenance and suggestions with clogging.  e.g. prior to this thread, I had never heard of a wiper blade or the idea of a holiday mode or how power cleanings without printing in between can actually help to drive the printhead to its fatal error end.  This thread has also inspired some people to successfully repair their printer themselves (which is definitely not for everyone) (and to write bad haiku). 

So don't give up on finding a solution, but for me, the thread has already served a great purpose-- so thanks. 

p.s. I have to think that the only reason why Decision One takes the old printhead back is that someone back at Epson is doing similar experiments to you as well as just examining printhead failures.  It's unfortunate that the cost of official Epson/D1 repair is frequently greater than the cost of a new printer as Epson corporate won't ever good numbers on the failures . . .

Logged
Pages: 1 ... 60 61 [62] 63 64 ... 77   Go Up