7900 streaking issue

[PeterAit]

All of a sudden my 7900 is placing these streaks on a photo. The scan shows an about 4" wide section of the photo. This area is supposed to be a uniform gray. The rest of the print was fine. After this, I put in a new LLK cartridge (it was almost empty) and ran a nozzle check, which came out fine. We tried it again and got a similar result. Is this the head hitting the paper? Thanks for any advice.

[Garnick]

All of a sudden my 7900 is placing these streaks on a photo. The scan shows an about 4" wide section of the photo. This area is supposed to be a uniform gray. The rest of the print was fine. After this, I put in a new LLK cartridge (it was almost empty) and ran a nozzle check, which came out fine. We tried it again and got a similar result. Is this the head hitting the paper? Thanks for any advice.

Hi Peter,

My first impression before reading your post is that you have indeed nailed the problem.  I've seen this myself, although not to this extent and usually very near the edge of a sheet or roll.  Have you experienced any sort of paper jam recently?  That's usually what would be the cause of such a problem.  Perhaps time to let the print head sit overnight on a very clean, soft and lint free cloth or paper towel soaked with distilled water, but of course not dripping wet.  You may have read posts in which Windex is used for this procedure, but there are apparently some possibly negative results from such a product, especially if it contains ammonia.  Hope this helps.

Gary     

[dchew]

Peter,
Yeah, this looks like a standard head strike to me. As Gary said, they tend to occur more often at the end of rolls when the suction system doesn't quite remove all the curl. I just widen the platen gap one step, which is from "STANDARD" to "WIDE" and it eliminates the problem.
PRINTER SETUP > PLATEN GAP > Arrow up to WIDE

That setting is sticky, so just remember to set it back when you switch paper and/or finish the roll.
Dave

[PeterAit]

Thanks for the suggestions. I have decided to give the printer a complete head ckeaning/wiper changing/etc as I have never done this in 5 years.

[Garnick]

Thanks for the suggestions. I have decided to give the printer a complete head ckeaning/wiper changing/etc as I have never done this in 5 years.

That sounds like a great idea Peter.  It certainly can't hurt to do the complete procedure, especially installing a new wiper.  There were some very helpful procedures we could do in Service Mode on the 7900/9900 series printers.  The Service Mode on the SC-P7000 is rather sparse in comparison and I miss the flexibility of the 9900 in that way.  As long as you have all of the information to do these procedures it's not a big job. And BTW, while you have access to the flushing box you should also clean that as much as possible, but I imagine the wiper would be the most important after 5 years of use.  Have fun Peter 

Gary