9880 Romance over

[Paul_F_Caldwell]

Well at least I got my two main jobs printed before the standard old Epson issues came back.

I was lucky wind bids on two large print jobs locally. Both required prints larger than my 7800 would handle. I made the decision to put some of the profits towards a 9880. I considered the 9800, as there were price breaks on it, but based on the marketing literature from Epson, I chose to move forward and get the 9880.

Setup, was perfect and the printer performed wonderfully, running both 2 full rolls of 260 weight Luster and 8 rolls of canvas. I noticed that I had no problems with clogs and started to feel that the "Eight-Channel MicroPiezo® AMC™ Print Head with Ink Repelling Coating Technology" technology might actually be for real.

However it all came to an end tonight. I had two large prints to get out, and used the 260 weight luster. These prints were perfect and I then setup to print a couple of smaller 13 x 19 prints. For these I went to standard Luster cut sheet. To my surprise the first print came out at 2880 x 1440 with pretty harsh banding and colors missing, classic signs of a clog.

I ran the standard nozzle check and sure enough I had multiple nozzles clogged on multiple colors. I had just finished two large prints, with no problems and in the space of 5 minutes, I had developed multiple clogs. The printer had not been turned off or cleaned. It took 4 standard cleaning cycles to get most of the bars to print again on the nozzle check but I also noticed that the clogs were moving from one set of colors to another, something I have always noticed with my older 7600 and 7800.

Net, it looks like the ink resistant technology may just be hype, for sure you can still get clogs with the 9880, but more important, the same old problems that were present with the 7600 and 7800 seem to have moved forward i.e the moving of a clog from one color to another during cleaning.

Printer has been installed about 40 days, and run pretty much every day since install with today being the first problem.

Windows XP sp 2, Printing from Adobe, using mainly stock Epson profiles, however on the canvas prints I used a custom profile and the Epson profile depending on the brand of canvas I used.

Paul Caldwell

[Ed Gerson]

Do you control the humidity where you print? Are you using electric or natural gas heating? Is your printer adjacent to outlets, open doorways?

- Ed

[Paul_F_Caldwell]

I am in Arkansas, where the relative humidity is always in the middle of the range during the winter. We don't get very dry here. In the summer of course the humidity is around 100%. Right now around 55 to 65%.

The house is heated with Nat. Gas, and all during the past month the heat has been on and off, with no problems on the printer. The printer is inside a room towards the back away from the doorway. Not sure by what you mean by outlets? power, yet, but it is controlled by a UPS.

What surprised me on this is how the clogs occurred while the printer was on and right after it made two perfect prints. Non of the carts was low all at least 35% full and it hadn't been turned off. I was also surprised by the persistence of this particular clog as it took 4 normal cleaning cycles to get back to production.

Paul Caldwell

[Ed Gerson]

Do you have a build up on the bottom of the jets, in other words, can you wipe dried stuff off the ? Haven't relied on inkjets in a while, thinking about getting back into it. Outlets? I meant floor outlets for HVAC, blowing cold or hot air upwards and into your machine. Sorry about that.

[BobSmith]

You mentioned printing through 8 rolls of canvas. Epson or other brand? I ask because I've had far fewer clogging head cleaning problems since switching back to an Epson Canvas from one of the earlier Breathing Color canvases. I loved the look and price of the BC canvas but the surface was not as pure and clean as Epson's. After an extended canvas printing session I'd begin to have issues brought on by dirty heads... clogging and odd random drops of ink scattered around a print. This is caused by a build up of lint and such on the bottom of the head. Thoroughly cleaning the wiper blade assembly and parking pad would cure the problem. I've not had to do this even once since switching back to Epson canvas about two years ago. It was a relatively frequent occurrence when printing on the Breathing Color product.

I have had a 9600 for almost five years and a 9800 for close to two. I get the occasional stubborn clog on either machine but they're rare... maybe a couple of times a year. Where numerous head cleanings are needed to bring back a perfect nozzle check. A little more frequently I get a simple clog where one or two cleanings gets things back to normal. Like you describe, on one of those stubborn clogs, the missing nozzle seems to move around. I'm betting this is caused by the wiper blade smearing and moving something around on the surface of the head.

Bob Smith

[Paul_F_Caldwell]

Hello Ed, I have overhead outlets, but they are about 5 feet away from the printer. I also have some covers over them so that they blow out not down. However I am sure that some of the air does get down on the printer. I try not to have the heat on when using the 9880, but our weather has been up and down as of late.

On the Canvas, I totally agree, Epson's is much much cleaner. I started with another brand of gloss canvas, which I still prefer as the overall look is just beautiful, however it also carries a lot of extra trash. It's actually amazing to look at the printer after printing a roll to see all the specs of backing that are all over the place. After the 2nd roll, I started taking the top cover off which is the only way you can really get inside to clean out the machine.

Before the clog, I had run 3 jobs of 5 24 x 36's 15 prints all on the 260 weight luster (which I feel is superior to the older 250 weight luster) Some of these prints had a lot of light blue sky or were sunsets with very faint transitions and I had no banding or spotting which I felt told me that I had gotten the printer clean. Then last night I made the first two prints on the 260 weight and they came out perfect, switched to the 13 x 19 and the print came out with traditional banding showing that the magenta was missing. No spots or anything, just banding. I sometimes wonder if this a driver screwup as I would get it sometimes on my 7800. Usually it would happen right at the end of a print, the last 1" or so would print fainter than the rest of the print. When this started most times the only way I could get past is was a power clean. It finally stopped on the 7800 about 6 months ago.

What puzzled me was that I had been using the printer everyday for the past 35 to 40 days working on these jobs so it never really sat idle very long. I was turning it off when not in use, but it was getting daily use.
Before I ran the two large prints, the 9880 had been off for about 3 days. If I had gotten the problem when I first started the printing, I would just figure that something had dried on the head etc. But when you get two perfect prints and then the printer clogs, that's both hard to accept and understand

[Ed Gerson]

Have you talked to Epson support? - Ed