NatureScapes.net Forums

My 3880 had been turned off for a couple of months.  I have had no complaints with the printer until yesterday.  I turned it on and made one print with PSCC.  It did not look at all like the computer screen.  I ran the Maintenance Clean routine, re-calibrated the computer with i1profiler and tried again.  Same look (see attachments).  I tried again with LRCC and no change.  Finally, I redirected the PSCC printer to a HP 8600 Officejet in the office.  As you can see from the attached files, the print made with 8600 looks much better than the one made with the 3880.  What should I do?  Until yesterday, printer has worked fine for over 4yr.

iphone photo of computer screen
                  photo of print by 3880 -
                   photo of file printed on HP 8600 Officejet

I've only just picked up my first Epson 3880 (secondhand) a few months ago so I'm far from being an expert on the subject. One suggestion that does come to mind is that the printer appears to be unable to print the darker areas. Is it possible that one of the black inks has run out? It may be showing that there is ink remaining when viewing the status monitor but apparently a known issue with this model is that the valve to do with the PK and MK black inks can develop a problem which allows all of the ink in one of the black cartridges to empty into the maintenance tank. The printer doesn't report this so still shows everything is ok with regards to ink levels. Try printing a nozzle check. Is the black ink printing correctly? Another option would be to do a black ink swap from PK to MK (or vice versa) and print the same image again to see if the issue is still there.

Thanks, Justin. All three photo black cartridges indicate nearly full status. I'll do a nozzle check and switch the first two cartridges, as you suggest.

Clogged nozzle - it will usually take three nozzle cleaning cycles to fully clear that up.

Although the photo black ink registered more than 1/2 full. By weight, it was empty. I switched to matte black and the printer passed the nozzle check etc. I'll do some more reading on the known issue with inaccurate readings of cartridge volume. Meantime, I ordered another Photo Black cartridge.

E.J. Peiker wrote:Clogged nozzle - it will usually take three nozzle cleaning cycles to fully clear that up.

Thanks, EJ.  I should receive a new Photo Black cartridge tomorrow or Wed.  I'll do some more nozzle checks than.

Whenever I have let the printer sit unused for more than a day I do a nozzle check (in other words every time I print I do a NC).
A nozzle check saves a lot of wasted paper and time.

Doug, if the PK cartridge registered 1/2 full but by weight felt empty, then most likely you have a stuck physical valve in the PK/MK ink delivery system, and all the ink drained out. The valve switches ink supply between the PK and MK cartridges, and something it fails. It can block PK and/or MK ink delivery completely, or do what Justin described above and drain the cartridge dry. Don't put a new cartridge in until you can verify if that is what's going on and fix it. Otherwise it's likely you may simply drain out the new cartridge as well.

Also, don't try to run head cleanings on an empty cartridge that registers some ink remaining. The printer will let you run the cleaning cycle because it thinks ink is there. But you can't clear a "clog" if the ink is simply gone, and you do run a risk burning out the head firing on nothing but air.

This is a known issue with the 3880...

Royce Howland wrote:Doug, if the PK cartridge registered 1/2 full but by weight felt empty, then most likely you have a stuck physical valve in the PK/MK ink delivery system, and all the ink drained out. The valve switches ink supply between the PK and MK cartridges, and something it fails. It can block PK and/or MK ink delivery completely, or do what Justin described above and drain the cartridge dry. Don't put a new cartridge in until you can verify if that is what's going on and fix it. Otherwise it's likely you may simply drain out the new cartridge as well.

Also, don't try to run head cleanings on an empty cartridge that registers some ink remaining. The printer will let you run the cleaning cycle because it thinks ink is there. But you can't clear a "clog" if the ink is simply gone, and you do run a risk burning out the head firing on nothing but air.

This is a known issue with the 3880...

Thanks, Royce.  I'll wait on the new PK cartridge before address the issue again. I am encouraged that the Nozzle Check looks fine with the printer set to matte ink.

Update:
I installed a new PK cartridge, ran the Nozzle check, and everything looked good. So I printed the above image and it looked great. Now, I'll make sure the PK ink is not draining off to the maintenance cartridge over night. I was tempted to remove the cartridge, but decided to have a positive attitude and expect it to work perfectly.

Sometimes forcing a switch from PK to MK and back again will un-stick the valve, if it was just a big hung up. If it's actually toast, switching inks won't fix anything, it will just drain off both black cartridges. Seems like that didn't happen to you when you switched to MK, so you might be in the clear now again.

Royce Howland wrote:Sometimes forcing a switch from PK to MK and back again will un-stick the valve, if it was just a big hung up. If it's actually toast, switching inks won't fix anything, it will just drain off both black cartridges. Seems like that didn't happen to you when you switched to MK, so you might be in the clear now again.

Royce,
Update:  Since my last post, I've printed 20-30 images using MK (matte) black with marginal success.  Most were BW and some were Sepia-BW.  There was a poor match between screen and print.  The prints were oversaturated and a bit dark, even though I had calibrated the monitor to ~120 with an i1Profiler. During this period, I used the old (empty) PK cartridge in order to prevent draining the new PK.  That may have have been a mistake, based upon the comments above about burning out the print head by printing with an empty cartridge.  How do I know if the head is ruined?

The following is a summary of events when I attempted to print with the new PK cartridge.  First, under the assumption that one or more of the nozzles might be clogged, I removed all cartridges, dampened a cotton baby wipe with isopropyl alcohol and placed it under the head.  The wipe picked up lots of black and several other colors, even after several treatments with the alcohol dampened cotton wipes.  Finally, I installed all the cartridges (including the new PK) and ran a head check followed by a head clean cycle.  Attached are iPhone photos of prints from both procedures.  I repeated the head cleaning twice and stopped, both because the pattern was getting better, but still not correct and because maintenance cartridge was full.  I recorded weights of each cartridge before and after the head cleaning.  The three blacks lost ~ 0.3 oz.  Other colors, not so much.

So, what are my choices?  Try more head cleanings, switch between MK and PK a couple of times, consider repair, look for an Epson refurbished 3880, or take up knitting?
Head check
Head clean

The head is severely clogged. Your best choice for now is to continue running cleaning cycles. Don't bang away running cleaning after cleaning, however, because that can risk damaging the head. You can also run a "purge pattern", a simple geometric image designed to exercise all of the ink channels by printing a single 8.5x11 sheet to move ink through the system.

As long as clogs of the nature above are showing in the nozzle test, you can't get good prints. The printer needs all nozzles to be firing properly or the image will have bigger or smaller areas of dropouts where some ink was not laid down properly.

This is probably not a "repair" situation. As long as you run 2 or 3 cleanings and a nozzle check shows improvement, the head isn't dead, just jammed up with old ink. You may need to physically clean the surface of the head as you did above if there's dried ink caked onto it. But generally speaking the clogs are internal and not really affected by external cleaning.

In some cases the clogs are not in the head itself, but in some units called dampers. If those are gummed up they can prevent proper flow of ink into the head. This is a sort-of repair situation, since the dampers can be replaced. I've done that kind of operation numerous times on our big Epsons though I've never found it necessary on the smaller 17" desktop models.

Whether you decide to take up knitting, well it may always be good to have a Plan B ready when we're talking about cranky technology.

Royce,

Thanks for the info and advice. I welcome and trust your opinions. The maintenance cartridge will arrive tomorrow, so I can try a few more cleaning cycles.


As to my plan B, knitting is much further down the alphabet than just #2. But, I must admit that fighting with a cranky printer has tested my patience.

dbolt wrote:Royce,

Thanks for the info and advice.  I welcome and trust your opinions.  The maintenance cartridge will arrive tomorrow, so I can try a few more cleaning cycles.


As to my plan B, knitting is much further down the alphabet than just #2.  But, I must admit that fighting with a cranky printer has tested my patience.

dbolt - I noticed you were waiting for your new maintenance tank ($20.) to arrive and it made me think of John Cone (  www.inkjetmall.com ) that has a business selling aftermarket inks and accessories especially designed for the various Epson printers. He also sells chip re-setters for the various Epson printer maintenance tanks, including your 3880 ($66.). When your tank is full you take off the top plastic cover of the maintenance tank (easy to do with a screwdriver), remove the foam soaked innards, replace with layers of regular paper towels, snap the cover back on, and re set the chip to read empty (with his chip re setter) and plug the tank back in. I have been doing this for 8 years now on my 4880 and my 9900 with no problems. It takes about 15 minutes to do it and your back in business! After 3 new maintenance tanks every one is basically free (paper towel expense only). My 4880 has only one maintenance tank, but the 9900 has two, so it didn't take too long before I was maintenance tank expense free! Your mileage may vary. 

Thanks, Mark, for the info. I've decided my decision is ow buying a new p800 or give up printing. Repair or a refurbished 3880 is not all that much less than a new printer. Considering how little I print, there is no way that I can actually justify having a 17" printer, but....

I'm now waiting to see how serious my withdrawal pains become.

I bit the bullet and purchased a p800. Very happy with the unit. Anyone interested in some partially used 3880 ink cartridges?

Very interesting thread. I'm having a similar problem with my old trusty 3880. LK is showing almost nothing (a few faint lines) with a nozzle check. Did several cleanings and now the Maintenance cartridge is full, with no improvement. Ordered 2 new maintenance cartridges, and Jon Cone's cleaning kit, but I am wondering if this is going to be worth the money-All other cartridges are full and print fine. (I took some classes with Jon- he advised me to try the simpler cleaning, and if no success, use his expensive cleaning system. That would be about the price of a new printer!) Not sure about the black switching mechanism -if that's a problem, I guess I'm headed for a new printer. Love this old machine-not sure what's out there that's nearly as reliable.

I too went for the P800-don't regret it, but they are scarce on the market now....
I did fix my 3880 with a cleaning kit from Inkjet Mall-not the cartridges-just the pink stuff . But I am not confident it will hold up.