Complete loss of LLK in a Epson 4900

[Georgecp]

Hello Walter,

I have been down the road...I ended up having the ink pump assembly replaced on my printer..it cost approx $500 but was well worth it.. The printer is rock solid now.  If I don't print for a week or so, one head cleaning gets the nozzles in perfect condition.

The symptom that led me to this conclusion was that when I had bad clogs and the power cleaning of the adjustment program would not work but the initial ink load function would work, it pointed me in that direction.

Hope this helps..

Happy New Year to all!

Regards,
George

[tsjanik]

Good news Walter.  The only good thing about these clogs is the relief felt when cleared 

George why does use of INIT FILL make you suspect the pump?

Tom

[John Parry]

Hello, I have a 3 year old Epson 4900 that is also giving me a serious headache. I've been trying to unclog the PK head - it is pretty well completely clogged. I hadn't used the printer for about 2 months and when fired up I had a completely clogged cyan head. Ran a cleaning cycle with no avail, so tried a cloth soaked in Windex and lo and behold that worked!. Noticed the PK head was lightly clogged so I ran a PK cleaning cycle and after that cycle it is now completely clogged. ran power cleanings (waiting 24hrs between each) and tried printing a full test print after each clean - but nothing works.

Just downloaded the service program and ran a CL2 on the PK channel, but still no luck. will try a CL3 clean tomorrow -if that doesn't work any ideas? No extended warranty. Tried Epson tech support - after they had me perform a power clean they want to change the print head - $425 just to get the tech out and $1500 for the head.

Hope everyone had a good New Years Eve.

Regards,
John

[tsjanik]

John:

Since you have the service program, you can try the initial fill.  It worked for me, see:

http://www.luminous-landscape.com/forum/index.php?topic=95756.0

and here:

http://www.luminous-landscape.com/forum/index.php?topic=95942.20

Make sure you have a near empty or extra waste tank and enough ink in the affected set.

Good luck,

Tom

[alan a]

I tried the initial fill on a defective Epson 7900.  It didn't work.  Maybe John will have better luck.  But consider this -- the initial fill will eat up hundreds of dollars of ink, or at least that is the case with a 7900.  So think about it carefully before you do it. 

John, I summarized my issues with the 7900 in the thread that compares the three manufacturers of printers.  The labor cost for a repair technician to walk in the door is $300 to $400.  The minimum cost of a repair for the 7900 would have been around $650, if that works.  (That would be the replacement of the cap pump assembly that worked for George.) And because the repair guys don't even know what is wrong, they just throw new parts at your machine, charging you each time, until one of them might fix the problem. 

That is a lot to spend on a printer that sells for about $2000.  When a repair is equal to 25% to 50% of the price of new printer, it might be wise to get a new printer with all new parts.  I decided to cut my losses and get rid of the 7900 and buy a Canon and make use of the rebate.  The rebate expired yesterday, but there will always be another one that will be offered.

Just bear in mind -- the more cleanings you do, especially the initial fill, the more money you thrown down a dark hole in search of the elusive fix.  I decided to get a brand new printer instead.

[John Parry]

Well I went ahead and tried the CL3 program - and lo and behold my PK head is back! (Well, most of it anyway - it's about 99% there. Unbelievable.

I am now printing and I cannot for the life of me see any issues. There are now 3 nozzles clogged. I've run about 15 test prints (I have 4 I use - all found from this forum) and am now printing prints from my trip to NC last summer. Can't see any defects and the colors are amazing. I do love this printer when it works.

I have to say thanks to everyone here - you guys really are amazing. if I hadn't found out about the service program from this forum (best $29.99 I've probably ever spent) the printer would have been sold for a song on Kijiji and I would have been looking at a 3880 (after about a year or so) to fill my printing itch.

By the way, the service program worked well with Win 8.1. 

I know the future is unknown with this printer but for know I'm printing all the shots I've been wanting to do for the past while.

Best Regards,
John

[Georgecp]

Hi Tom,

Happy New Year...sorry for the delay in responding.

The reason I went down that path of INIT FILL pointing to pump problem was the following:

1) If power cleans did not clear up the issue, then something else was causing the ink to not flow through the print heads
2) If INIT FILL was solving the issue and the printer was printing without clogs right after the INIT FILL was executed, then ink supply could be the culprit, not clogged heads
3) If after a few days of sitting, the printer showed no lines printing AND a simple power clean was not fixing the problem BUT and INIT FILL was, then it was definitely an ink supply issue.

This led me to the conclusion that the ink pump could be the issue.  I discussed it with my local Epson reseller/service person who is pretty good and practical.  I decided to take the risk and invest in the new pump..the difference, as I stated before, is night and day...

My guess, and only a guess, is that the original pump was not producing enough pressure to pressurize the ink head and keep it pressurized...

Best,
George

[walter.sk]

Well, I got my new maintenance tank after having done half of an Ink Initial Refill that stopped when the first tank was filled.  Since many of the nozzles in the offending head (PK) were now OK in printing a nozzle check, I did a CL2 cleaning of it and the 3 others that were less than 100% clear.  No change, so I tried a CL3 cleaning.  The PK head now was completely clean, as was one of the others.  The 4th showed only a very few nozzles clogged so, rather than spend a huge amount of ink on redoing the Initial Refill I decided to print a couple of files to see what would happen.

I chose images that would use as many of the inks as possible, and they seemed OK.  I examined them under bright light with a magnifying glass and could see no problems.  So the half of the Initial Refill plus the CL3 got my 4900 back for me.  This time I will print at least a letter-size print every couple of days to keep things working, but I now have the Adjustment Program as a tool. 

Incidentally, the Adjustment Program would not work with the LAN connection, but only with the USB connection, so if somebody here  plans to use the Adjustment Program, make sure you have a USB cable or extension that will reach your printer.