I saw a comedian start a skit once by saying, "Listen, you've got to believe what I'm about to tell you is true or this joke just doesn't work."
There's a lesson in that I've always thought...
In the spirit of past lessons learned I am starting my skit here just the same; you've got to believe what I'm about to tell you or this just won't work. Since the inception of this thread I have been on a journey for knowledge that will reveal the actual answers to our nozzle clogging issues, not just the speculative ones. I want to know what they are, where they come from, and how to avoid them. This journey of course evolved over time, eventually branching into various new realms of potential technical mysteries that would easily give Einstein a migrane headache lasting more consecutive days than it took God to create our entire world.
By the way I'm not sure any of you know this but Ernst Dinkla actually IS God.
Curiously, what's become the most fascinating element in all this to me is not actually technically based at all. It's the barrier. The wall if you will. The great Epson divide between those that know (Epson side of the wall), and those that need to know (users side of the wall). For sure I am not the only one who finds it a painfully daunting reality that of the many thousands of times this thread has been read, pondered, argued and responded to, not one person from the other side of this great divide has chimed in to shed a proper light on the subject. The more we read, the more we right, the higher up this ladder of knowledge we seem to get - the farther into mystery this ladder seems to lead us. The more we learn, the less we realize we actually know. This great wall, for those of you without extended warranties (like myself), might too leave you feeling a little...
I don't know about you but I do OK in the rain. This quest for knowledge has been a quiet one for weeks now, but that's about to end. Ladies and gentlemen please fasten your seat-belts and kindly keep your arms in the vehicle at all times.
It's been a bitch aligning time zones but today it finally happened - I got the call from
. His real name is not HAL 9000. It's been changed here, by me, to protect him from the mother ship. HAL is, after all, from the other side of the great divide. And HAL has shared with me information which is usually left sealed behind the man-made walls that Epson built, and rather aggressively maintains.
First, there is no Epson X900 LLK printhead channel problem. There is however a problem - it's just not specific to color, ink, or channels. The problem, or challenge, is quite simply the fact that X900 heads have smaller nozzles. Period. Initially there was indeed a color specific nozzle clogging problem, but it was GREEN not LLK. Apparently green ink is used the least, which leaves it far more vulnerable to the very same challenges that all of our X900 nozzles face. This color specific problem was successfully addressed years ago by Epson via changes in ink only. Lastly, and I can think of one person right off the bat who is likely going to shoot flaming darts at me for sharing this, straight from the largest horse in the Epson Technical corral's mouth - the current X900 printhead clog reporting average aims specifically toward no specific color at all.
Second, who here remembers our first prognosis of the X900 printhead clear-nozzle-maintaining dilemma? Does the name "Wiper Blade" ring a bell? How bout Flushing Box, is that doing anything for you? ...Still nothing? OK try this, and properly enunciate for me - it'll help you remember. "Dried up, funky, tar-like, nasty riddled splooge left on your printhead's face from multiple repeated-a-hundred-times-too-many power cleanings ended with a cockeyed wiper blade from hell doing more harm than good to your ever so precious printhead, which just so happens to be DYING to get clogged." ...That did it didn't it. You remember now. The general consensus from the professional world of Epson service and repair states that there is a direct connection between user neglect, and X900 nozzle clogs.
Turns out we were on the right track with the whole wiper blade changing thing. But there is more to this than just the wiper blade. Apparently we need to stay on top of something else too - which is more involved but just as important. The Flushing Box. You saw this in the wiper changing video I made. It's the colorful screen & foam "dumping station" with all the rectangular rubber seals that keep your head from drying while docked. Apparently this screen has a tendency to clog as well. Once clogged the ink being forced through your printhead's face during power cleanings does not properly/entirely get drained through the screen and to your maintenance tank - away from your printhead face during docking periods, or more importantly in the case of clogging - during power cleanings. Effectively what is happening is simple; during cleanings WE ARE IN FACT FORCING tar-like half dried ink left on our Wiper Blades and splashed back up from mucky puddles in our dirty neglected Flushing Boxes BACK THROUGH THE TINY NOZZLE OPENINGS IN OUR PRINTHEADS!
Is anyone else horrified right now? Suddenly it all makes sense, doesn't it - how sometimes cleanings leave you with more clogs than you had to begin with. Well now we know why.
Third, no one you ask at Epson will admit to this but Epson has their own cleaning solutions for cleaning these printheads. You can't buy it because it is yet another Epson thing that does not exist, but it does, you just can't have it, but you can, you just can't tell anybody that you have it, or where you got it from. Sorry for saying this, I usually have such a nice attitude, but WTF.
I can tell you that this cleaning solution is so powerful it comes colored RED, and it comes in two parts. One part, the cleaning part, is RED. The second part is the neutralizer. The idea is to run neutralizer through your head until no RED traces exist. The use of this solution is suggested by Epson, to Epson, to be used only as a last resort. Apparently this RED cleaning solution has a bit of an attitude, and can do damage if used improperly. Or even when it's used properly, sometimes..
Fourth, the reason Epson service techs replacing printheads under warranty (be they Decision One or anyone else certified by Epson to do warranty work) take your original head back with them instead of leaving it with you is simple: They have to return them to Epson. In fact every part being replaced by Epson under warranty, no matter how trivial, gets returned to Epson at Epson's expense - which think about it, sometimes shipping alone makes that a loss if the part is tiny enough. Doesn't matter - Epson police this policy with great diligence. They do not want service guys selling used Epson parts on ebay or anywhere else.
Fifth,
Sixth,
Seventh,
Eighth,
I could go on for hours but I don't want to wake up with a horse head on my pillow. Suffice to say we all know a little more than we did five minutes ago. The general consensus of those in the know is that our head, which is being cleaned by Vladimir in Canada right now, has a 50/50 chance of coming back operational. Apparently there are very delicate barrier walls made of thin almuninum-foil-type material which separate ink channels from one another. If these barriers are compromised by too much pressure being forced through the head, you can imagine what will happen - Ezmorelda's red lipstick will come out looking like some torrid mix of red/black muck. The other consensus, from those in the know, is that our particular clogging problem is most likely ink related, not piezoelectical.
This post took me hours to write, which is disgusting.
