need head info on ipf6400

[mearussi]

I just bought a used ipf6400. I printed out a complete nozzle check in maintenance mode and found two small lines missing, one from each head. I understand that the printer can map around clogged nozzles to some extent but I don't know how much of an extent that is.

What I want to know is how many nozzles need to be missing before I need to buy another head?

[I.T. Supplies]

From my understanding from our Canon rep is that a print head is locked to the printer it's put into and if you try to put into another printer, it may not function properly since the head was already filled with ink.  If you have missing nozzles, this could "possibly" be an issue upfront with a used head, but I'm not confirming that problem since I haven't heard anyone else do that.

Have you done a cleaning or just the nozzle check to verify what's firing properly?  I don't recall how many nozzles are per color, but there should be enough to work with printing while the printer attempts to clean the clogged ones.  I'd recommend contacting Canon to check on this and "maybe" they might help you with a head.  800-423-2366

[stockjock]

I just bought a used ipf6400. I printed out a complete nozzle check in maintenance mode and found two small lines missing, one from each head. I understand that the printer can map around clogged nozzles to some extent but I don't know how much of an extent that is.

What I want to know is how many nozzles need to be missing before I need to buy another head?

I have had an iPF8400 for 4 years.  I assume you mean you are missing a few segments of the grid pattern that is printed rather than the entire line?  That isn't a big deal and I normally don't even bother to do a head cleaning A if that is the case.  If you start getting more like 6-10 segments missing you would probably want to do a Head Cleaning A which doesn't use much ink.  I'm not sure I've ever resorted to a Head Cleaning B which uses quite a lot of ink. 

At some fairly random point in the life of the print head you will start getting error messages from the printer.  That is when you can start becoming more concerned.  Often you can bring the head back for a while by running several head cleanings or even doing a Head Cleaning B but you have to be careful because there seems to be some concern by users of these printers that a failing head can cause a short in the main circuit board.  That is a big deal and most likely the end of the printer.  So far I have replaced two heads in 4 years.  I have a third head that gave me a few error messages but had a clear nozzle check so I continued using it and so far no new errors.  Unfortunately, nothing I've read suggests this is an exact science.

[enduser]

There was someone on the old ipf wiki that put a protection fuse in the main board and also sent the wiring for it to the outside of the printer. This way the board was protected from overloads caused by nozzle short-outs. He claimed great success, you would have thought the manufacturer might have done this?

[howardm]

As I recall from prior reading, if you enter service mode and do a nozzle check from there, it shows you the TRUE state of the head including all the mapped out nozzles.

[mearussi]

As I recall from prior reading, if you enter service mode and do a nozzle check from there, it shows you the TRUE state of the head including all the mapped out nozzles.

Which is what I did. So far I'm missing two out of 30,760. I was just wondering how many I have to lose before the head needed replacing.