Quite an experience with my Epson 3800

[Eric Brody]

I print mostly on matte paper, occasionally on glossy with my now seven year old Epson 3800. I just returned from a workshop with John Sexton and Charlie Cramer (excellent by the way) and since Charlie has measured deeper blacks with glossy or luster paper, I thought I'd run some of his favorite paper (Ilford Smooth Pearl) through the printer. I did a quick nozzle check and lo and behold there was virtually nothing coming out of the photo black nozzle. The printer had been idle for about 10 days and was off. I did a cleaning, both from the printer utility and from the printer, maybe a bit better, then it looked like the yellow was contaminated by the black. I did a super cleaning from the printer panel, better still. Then I made a print, huge black ink blobs along the right side of the print. I then tried the windex manuver, paper towel soaked with windex beneath the print head. It too helped, but then I needed to realign the printheads because of banding. I went in with q-tips, and windex and cleaned EVERYTHING I could see, perhaps most importantly the wiper. I gently injected windex where the head parks. Through all of this I went through almost an entire PK cartridge. In the end, happily, something must have worked because I can now print luster or matte papers with no blobs, and the nozzle check shows clean, nice yellows too. This is important since I'm working on aspens I shot in the Eastern Sierra.
I thought my printer was a goner. I thought about a repair but then figured I did not want to put serious money into a seven year old machine. The motto? I guess I was lucky. One of the websites I looked at had a link to the repair manual and it clearly says it has an service life of 5 years! However, it also mentions 12,000 A2 pages.

[Farmer]

How old was the PK ink cartridge?  I'm guessing that since you rarely did glossy work in the past it may have been quite old and the problem may have been mostly about the old ink (pigment settlement etc).

Glad that it's come back and still going for you!

[kevinzdyb]

I just had the exact same experience today with my 6 year old 3800. I had not used my printer for a while and when I tried to print the color looked poor. Upon doing a nozzle check the photo black seemed to be the problem. It showed 1/4 full on the display but felt empty so I plugged in a new cartridge. As soon as I did this I get black blobs and poor color on my prints. I tried matte paper and got 24 blobs on my print. I do not know much about printers so I dropped it off at a nearby Epson authorized service center. Maybe I should pick it back up and try your troubleshooting steps. Is there better documentation online somewhere on the exact steps?

Thanks!

[Eric Brody]

Not quite so fast. I thought I had solved my problems, until I tried paper larger than A4 (8.5x11) and got incredible banding. I ran head alignment from both the printer utility and the printer panel and had no success. Now I'm back trying to decide if it's worth putting repair money into a 7 year old machine with a manufacturer stated life of 5 years. The 3880 now has a $US300 rebate, a warranty, and a full set of inks.
What to do?

[kevinzdyb]

Seems like we have a similar issue. I might hear back from the repair center today and will post the outcome. This particular repair center will give me a free estimate, the other center in town would charge me $100.00 diagnostics and $200.00 labor to identify the issue.

[AFairley]

Not quite so fast. I thought I had solved my problems, until I tried paper larger than A4 (8.5x11) and got incredible banding. I ran head alignment from both the printer utility and the printer panel and had no success. Now I'm back trying to decide if it's worth putting repair money into a 7 year old machine with a manufacturer stated life of 5 years. The 3880 now has a $US300 rebate, a warranty, and a full set of inks.
What to do?

7 years old, I say forget it.  I was in a similar situation with my 3800 that had developed ink glop problems.  After a DYI attempt to clean up the capping assembly and wiper blade didn't do the trick I was faced with putting at least $150 into the machine to replace the capping station, the starting place for a fix, with no guaranty that it would fix the problem.  I sprang for a 3880.  I reused all of my ink carts except for the magentas in the 3880 and sold the 3800 w/o inks to someone adventurous for $100 (with full disclosure).  So, factoring in my rebate, the value of the new set of inks and the $100 from the sale, I was out of pocket some, but avoiding the risk of pouring money into futile repairs made it worth it.

[kevinzdyb]

Can you take all of the partial inks from a 3800 and insert them into a 3880?

[AFairley]

Yes, except for the two mangentas (which are a different formulation, and which you can't physically insert anyway).  BTW, you can prime the new printer with the old carts (except magenta), but don't use carts that are less than at least 1/3 full or else they may get sucked dry and the priming will abort and then you'll have to do a full second priming which will waste a bunch of ink and load up your waste tank.

[Eric Brody]

I've pretty much decided to do what AFairley did. I spoke with the local Epson repair center and while they were quite pleasant and not pushy at all, it was pretty obvious that I'd end up sinking a fair amount of money into a pretty old machine, at least by today's digital standards. I've got an new 3880 waiting for me at my local store. Thanks for the advice on using the 3800 inks, (except for the magentas and those that are pretty low). Every little bit helps.

[AFairley]

Once the new printer is primed, you can swap in the really low old carts and use them up, then go back to the new carts you used to prime.

[Farmer]

Any opened carts, make sure you store them in their box in a draw.  You don't have to seal over the holes but it's not a terrible idea (a bit of cling film - don't use sticky tape) either if you think they're going to be sitting for a while and I'd leave them holes to the side rather than up just to help prevent any little specks drying and potentially causing an issue.

We have "open" carts sitting around all the time and they're fine with just that little bit of care.

[mlondon]

Having just gone thru a very similar experience my self, I can highly recommend that you consider the 7 years you got out of your printer well paid off, and invest in a new 3880. Mine was 6.5 years old and it would have been foolish to sink any more into it for repairs.

There is a $300 rebate on the 3880 now (I just got mine from John at ShadesOfPaper). Cant go wrong.

[Eric Myrvaagnes]

My 3800 is about five and a half years old and going just great. But when it dies, I hope there will still be a decent rebate available on a 3880 (or its successor).

[KatManDEW]

I print mostly on matte paper, occasionally on glossy with my now seven year old Epson 3800. I just returned from a workshop with John Sexton and Charlie Cramer (excellent by the way) and since Charlie has measured deeper blacks with glossy or luster paper, I thought I'd run some of his favorite paper (Ilford Smooth Pearl) through the printer. I did a quick nozzle check and lo and behold there was virtually nothing coming out of the photo black nozzle. The printer had been idle for about 10 days and was off. I did a cleaning, both from the printer utility and from the printer, maybe a bit better, then it looked like the yellow was contaminated by the black. I did a super cleaning from the printer panel, better still. Then I made a print, huge black ink blobs along the right side of the print. I then tried the windex manuver, paper towel soaked with windex beneath the print head. It too helped, but then I needed to realign the printheads because of banding. I went in with q-tips, and windex and cleaned EVERYTHING I could see, perhaps most importantly the wiper. I gently injected windex where the head parks. Through all of this I went through almost an entire PK cartridge. In the end, happily, something must have worked because I can now print luster or matte papers with no blobs, and the nozzle check shows clean, nice yellows too. This is important since I'm working on aspens I shot in the Eastern Sierra.
I thought my printer was a goner. I thought about a repair but then figured I did not want to put serious money into a seven year old machine. The motto? I guess I was lucky. One of the websites I looked at had a link to the repair manual and it clearly says it has an service life of 5 years! However, it also mentions 12,000 A2 pages.

Sorry to hear about your problem. I'm having trouble with a two year old Canon iPF myself.

Ilford Smooth Pearl is also my favorite paper. What do you think about the "price increase"? I haven't measured the thickness of the new stuff yet, but I swear it's no heavier, and it's 22% more expensive for a 12% shorter roll.