R2000 print problems

[Jonzjob]

I have had the printer for several years now with no problems. Just recently there was a problem with the printer after I had changed the cartridge for a non OEM carttridge. It wouldn't recognise it.

I contacted The Cartridge People who I had got it from and as I had bought a couple of them they suggested that I try another one which was then recognised. I went on to use the printer and the quality was all over the place. So I did a head clean. From there on it went down hill and after a couple more head cleans I started searching around for a solution. I found a site that recommended flushing the heads through with a cleaning fluid, but not to use the ones with ammonia or IPA as they could cause damage, so I got a JETlifetech kit.

I followed their instructions and it didn't make any difference, so I thought about removing the print head and seeing if I could find the problem. I washed the head through on all colours with the cleaning fluid and refitted it.

The yellow cartridge was very low so I slotted a new OEM one in. Another head clean to flush the cleaner out and tried a test page. It came out near perfect except that the yellow is totally missing. This morning I wondered if it could be an airlock? So I flushed it through with the cleaner and left it for an hour or so and this afternoon I thought that rather than more head cleans and possible problems I would print of solid blocks of yellow, just over 1/2 a page of it. After numerous pages the yellow is still not printing. But when I checked the ink levels the yellow content has gone down by about 1/6th. I have no idea where the ink has gone but it isn't on the paper!

Has anyone any ideas on this one please?

 

[Jonzjob]

Just a quick update. I thought that I had it sorted and when I did yet another test page all of the colours came out OK. The magenta was not perfect, but??

So I then tried a full page of the 6 colours in blocks done on Open Office Writer. Five of the six printed, but no yellow, so how can it be that it will print on a test page but not from the Open Office page?

I wondered if it could be a setting in 'Open Office' so I tried a photo with green and yellow in it. Opened it in Preview and printed in in economy mode

The original

And the print

For the bird watchers, it's a siskin sat on my arm. Recovering after it flew in to one of our windows

 

[Jonzjob]

I assume that nobody has any idea what the problem could be?

 

[Shadowman]

This link might help you, years ago I had to use the soaking method with an HP 7960 printer/cartridge, only had these issues with non-OEM cartridges. If you can see yellow on the sheet after soaking that would rule out damaged nozzles.

How to Clean an HP Printhead – Printer Guides and Tips from LD Products

 

[Jonzjob]

Thank you Shadowman, but as I said above, on a Test Page done from System Preferences, Printers and Scanners all of the colours print. It's only if I try to print from anything else on our Mac system it misses out the yellow.

The above 2 photos are, the first from Preview on out system and, the second is a scan of that photo printed out on the R2000. What should be green is blue, i.e. the yellow is missing.

 

[Shadowman]

Does the R2000 allow you to print a nozzle check, it may show gaps in the pattern?

 

[Jonzjob]

Yes it does a nozzle check and all of the colours are there and it is now showing almost perfect print and as I said above, I have just retried to print a block of yellow and a block of magenta from my Open Office Writer program

The yellow does not print but the magenta does.

The thing that I don't understand is that when I select 'Show Printer Web Page' from 'System Preferences' Printers & Scanners' and look at the 'Ink Available' it shows the yellow content dropping. So it is using the ink, I just have no idea where it is going. I have also done some cleaning of the pad under the print head park area and that seems fairly clean and the general print quality is OK as the printer picture of the bird above shows. That was done in the 'Economy' mode'.

I know that the yellow is not very distinct, but I can assure that it is not there. Before my retirement I was an IBM mainframe hardware engineer and part of my job was printers. They ranged from desktop to 20,000 lines a minute laser printers, but none of them were inkjet. I do know how to check print quality, but this has me stumped?

I really do appreciate you help

 

[Shadowman]

I would recheck your color management settings, perhaps you have two different profiles chosen.

 

[Jonzjob]

I have been wondering if something like that was a possibility, but as far as I know nothing has been changed?

We have had problems in the past where the printer could not be found for print jobs and what I have done for that is to delete the printer and reload it with the 'Bonjour' profile. It has been fine after doing that. I have tried the same this time but still no difference. I have also tried it from our iMac and it still will not print the yellow from any other program than the print test page/nozzle check.

Do you have any idea as to how I can check the colour management settings as it's something I've never been near before?

I have to admit that it's getting quite expensive now as it has used almost all of the inks for 3 new cartridges and I just wish I knew a way to stop the use of the Gloss optimiser as it's not needed most of the time and it just goes so quickly.

 

[Shadowman]

Check out this link.

Using Color Management (epson.com)

 

[VA1DER]

Hi, sorry just saw this thread. There is a lot of information to pass on here, so I'll divide it up.

Ink levels:
As far as your ink level goes, the printer doesn't have an ink flow meter. It isn't measure yellow ink used. It just knows how much ink is in each drop it tries to print and adds them up to get the amount of ink used. So regardless of whether that ink is making it onto the paper, the ink "level" as reported by the cartridge is going to drop any time the printer is actually trying to print that colour. If you clamped off the yellow tube, the yellow ink level would still go down any time you tried to print yellow.

Aftermarket Cartridge Issues: Recognition
Secondly, there are two general issues with the aftermarket cartridges you are using. One is that they are Chinese-made and the auto-reset-chip on them, while the chips themselves almost always work, the contacts on them are just plain copper and not gold or silver plated. The cartridge itself is made of softer plastic and the way the chip is mounted doesn't always consistently make good electrical connection with consistent pressure against the printer's contacts. In short, there can be intermittent times when the chip isn't recognized. I don't have an R2000 myself, but I do have several WF-7720s that use almost identical cartridges. I have found that a spray of deoxit helps, both on the cartridge chip and on the printer's contacts. That being said, there have been times when my printer stops recognizing a cartridge right in the middle of a print and I have to take it out, spray it, center the chip (which on mine is removable and can have its position manipulated slightly).

Aftermarket Cartridge Issues: Priming
The second general problem aftermarket cartridges have, especially of the style you are using, is a bad tendency to not be properly primed. I think you are likely to have an air bubble and here is why. First the refillable cartridges need to have the air-return hole unplugged. Also these cartridges have an ink and air-return path that is resistant to flow until the ink path has been fully (and most often forcefully) wetted. Surface tension in the ink otherwise often prevents proper flow - there are usually little ink filters inside that especially do not like to let ink flow through them until they are wetted and have had ink drawn through. Until there there is often air in the system, of particular issue for you is that there is almost always an air bubble just above the check valve that then lets air get into the printer tubing. At this point you likely have an air bubble inside the yellow tubing. More on the remedy for this below, but it will involve using the aftermarket yellow cartridge, so make sure your aftermarket cartridges are primed properly. You need a syringe and possibly a special end for it. You put the syringe end up the output valve of the cartridge high enough that it activates the valve ball and draw ink through. Some syringed can do this themselves, but often you need the end I linked. I do this about 3 or 4 times, putting the ink right back in the cartridge. You will be able to feel the resistance at first then hear the path clear and will feel the ink draw through easily. Just be careful you never draw all the ink out at once. When you put the ink back in there will likely be a few bubbles on top, this is fine as long as they don't get drawn through.

Cleaning Solution
Whomever told you not to use any cleaner with ammonia in it gave you some very bad advice and totally doesn't understand Epson ink chemistry. Epson inks are all water based. Because of this, they would not normally be water-fast so they use chemistry tricks to make it more water resistant after they dry. They do this by being formulated to be water soluble only when they are at a slightly basic pH. They become water-fast by reacting with carbon dioxide in the air as they dry to neutralize the base and become slightly acidic (CO2 dissolved in water becomes carbonic acid). Dried Epson ink doesn't dissolve well unless the cleaner you use is slightly basic, and ammonia is the best way to do that. A great ink cleaner to make at home is 75% alcohol with 25% Windex (the kind with ammonia). You don't need to buy special ones.

Way Forward:
The most likely problem you have, or at least started with, is air in the printer ink path between where the yellow cartridge inserts and the print head. Attempting to print solid yellow isn't a terrible idea. When I have experienced similar issues with a single colour, I generally intermix a major head cleaning with trying to print a page or two solid of the troubled colour. Use the (properly primed) aftermarket cartridges so you're not wasting expensive ink. I have seen it take up to 5-6 major head cleanings to get some air bubbles out. Head cleanings will end up pulling a lot of other colours through too and stressing the ink pads, though. If there is dried ink blocking the path the most likely location for that is where the cartridge inserts and the spine penetrates the cartridge. If nothing works, then post again.

 

[Jonzjob]

That is quite a reply Va1der.

I am already using Epson cartridges after trying non OEM ones.

Below is a photo of the nozzle check/test page print and apart from just 3 misses on the magenta it is about perfect

But when I try to print this page in Open Office Writer

I get tghis. There is the slightest ghost where the yellow should be but it isn't yellow but one of the other colours that would make up the shade of yellow I selected. As I said abouv, I have also tried printing green, but it just comes out as blue, no yellow in it.

The yellow is missing. The top and lower are photos as the nozzle check print wouldn't scan and the OO Writer wouldn't do a screen print properly. Hence the darker colouring.

The yellow printing on the nozzle check would indicate that the yellow doesn't have any kind of blockage and I am thinking that it has got to be something in the setup as far as our MacBook and iMac are concerned, but nothing has been changed on either of them immediately before the problem started and it seems a very long shot that both Macs would cause the same problem at the same time out of the blue?

I had a down level driver on my MacBook, but that has now been upped to the latest and the problem is still the same.

I thank you again Va1der, but I can't see how it could be anything in your advise?

Shadowman, I have been through the colour settings and can't see any problems there?

I have also contacted Epson UK and they are also looking in to the problem for me, so I will try to keep you updated.

 

[VA1DER]

Well, that's far more interesting a problem. Can you retake the photo of the printout with better light? It looks like there is /something/ printed on the yellow block space, I'd like to see what it is.

 

[Jonzjob]

This is about as good as it gets. It's difficult to see anything but a very slight ghost of shading there even under a strong light with a magnifying glass

As you say, an interesting problem and so far an expensive one