Thanks Wayne a good tip to tweak and calculate.
Wouldn't it be better to print some more on the least used nozzles?
I expect that on a low volume printer there's printed something from time to time and this will "advance" the ink that's used.
The problem I'm trying to address is the issue of after cleaning nozzles, some air sometimes get pulled back in. So the following nozzle test "may" show different nozzles clogged. Unfortunately the term "clog" has come to cover anytime a nozzle doesn't print, but in reality frequently the reason isn't a clog, but air. So my idea was to print a small amount of ink out of every nozzle in the head ... trying to not use up too much ink but enough that when you run the nozzle test the issue of the air is no longer there. I believe Epson recommends printing something before running a nozzle check to make sure this doesn't happen, I'm just trying to create a page that insures that happens. I'm probably going to reduce it down to half a page because this should be enough to accomplish this.
The idea for the page was to make sure every nozzle was getting used. I also thought it would be better if it happened sort of randomly, that's why the gradient goes from side to side instead of top to bottom. After the first inch or so, every nozzle should be pushing out a droplet on every pass. Of course, since I'm no engineer and am clueless how the Epson dithers this thing, I could be totally off base, but it seems a logical assumption.
Personally I think Epson should design this into the firmware ... whenever you print a nozzle check it first prints a small block of each ink color. Would take very little ink, and each block would be one individual ink so it may even help diagnose problems.
I didn't design this as a way to purge ink lines (I'm trying to use as little ink as possible) , although what you suggest might be a good idea, because some colors see very little usages in normal photographic printing. I can't imagine anyone who invested this much money would print that little, but then again for some it's not about the money but the quality.
If any Canon or HP users are lurking here, those printers nozzles actually clog just as easy as an Epson, but instead of clearing them it remaps to spare nozzles. This would be a big problem except the printers actively maintain the nozzles with trace amounts of ink as long as you leave it powered on. If I still owned a Canon I would probably never turn the thing off, even if I wasn't using it for a couple of months. Takes extremely little power and very little ink, and your nozzles will thank you. (and your heads probably won't need replaced as soon).