Nozzle check - enough to prevent clogging?

[machoman]

Is a nozzle check good enough to maintain and prevent an inkjet printer from clogging?

 

[Philip Eihuyar]

Is a nozzle check good enough to maintain and prevent an inkjet printer from clogging?

If done regularly such as every 4 days or so. Not every couple of months or when there is a problem. A app that does this without any input from you comes in handy if you tend to forget to print regularly. Inkjet plumber does this. It is free. Many like Q-Image which does this also. What printer are you using?

 

[NAwlins Contrarian]

Is a nozzle check good enough to maintain and prevent an inkjet printer from clogging?

Whether printing a nozzle check every few days would suffice to prevent an inkjet printer from clogging may depend in part on the printer. With many and maybe all of the current and recent-past Canons, if you tell the printer to print a nozzle check, and it thinks it should perform a self-cleaning, then it will perform a self-cleaning before printing the nozzle check. And that will almost certainly suffice to prevent clogs.*

With other brands of printers, I am far less certain. The amount of ink used to print a nozzle check is very small. How reliable would that be, e.g., if done once per week, to prevent a pigment-ink Epson from clogging? I don't know, but I do think a bunch of variables can affect this.

*At least if you are using genuine Canon cartridges with their original ink loads. Refilling, CISSes, and third-party inks can introduce other issues, and my sense from many anecdotes is that some or all of these circumstances can increase the risk of clogs.

 

[DotCom Editor]

Is a nozzle check good enough to maintain and prevent an inkjet printer from clogging?

Whether printing a nozzle check every few days would suffice to prevent an inkjet printer from clogging may depend in part on the printer. With many and maybe all of the current and recent-past Canons, if you tell the printer to print a nozzle check, and it thinks it should perform a self-cleaning, then it will perform a self-cleaning before printing the nozzle check. And that will almost certainly suffice to prevent clogs.*

With other brands of printers, I am far less certain. The amount of ink used to print a nozzle check is very small. How reliable would that be, e.g., if done once per week, to prevent a pigment-ink Epson from clogging? I don't know, but I do think a bunch of variables can affect this.

*At least if you are using genuine Canon cartridges with their original ink loads. Refilling, CISSes, and third-party inks can introduce other issues, and my sense from many anecdotes is that some or all of these circumstances can increase the risk of clogs.

I print a nozzle check on my PRO-4000 once or twice a week, if I'm not generating sufficient photographic output. But, alas, I'm now the victim of an error message telling me to replace the $675 printhead. I'm waiting until the day after my credit card monthly cycle closes before I order one.

 

[Philip Eihuyar]

Is a nozzle check good enough to maintain and prevent an inkjet printer from clogging?

Whether printing a nozzle check every few days would suffice to prevent an inkjet printer from clogging may depend in part on the printer. With many and maybe all of the current and recent-past Canons, if you tell the printer to print a nozzle check, and it thinks it should perform a self-cleaning, then it will perform a self-cleaning before printing the nozzle check. And that will almost certainly suffice to prevent clogs.*

With other brands of printers, I am far less certain. The amount of ink used to print a nozzle check is very small. How reliable would that be, e.g., if done once per week, to prevent a pigment-ink Epson from clogging? I don't know, but I do think a bunch of variables can affect this.

*At least if you are using genuine Canon cartridges with their original ink loads. Refilling, CISSes, and third-party inks can introduce other issues, and my sense from many anecdotes is that some or all of these circumstances can increase the risk of clogs.

I print a nozzle check on my PRO-4000 once or twice a week, if I'm not generating sufficient photographic output. But, alas, I'm now the victim of an error message telling me to replace the $675 printhead. I'm waiting until the day after my credit card monthly cycle closes before I order one.

How long has this printhead lasted and how much use did you get out of it? That's expensive to replace.

 

[DotCom Editor]

Is a nozzle check good enough to maintain and prevent an inkjet printer from clogging?

Whether printing a nozzle check every few days would suffice to prevent an inkjet printer from clogging may depend in part on the printer. With many and maybe all of the current and recent-past Canons, if you tell the printer to print a nozzle check, and it thinks it should perform a self-cleaning, then it will perform a self-cleaning before printing the nozzle check. And that will almost certainly suffice to prevent clogs.*

With other brands of printers, I am far less certain. The amount of ink used to print a nozzle check is very small. How reliable would that be, e.g., if done once per week, to prevent a pigment-ink Epson from clogging? I don't know, but I do think a bunch of variables can affect this.

*At least if you are using genuine Canon cartridges with their original ink loads. Refilling, CISSes, and third-party inks can introduce other issues, and my sense from many anecdotes is that some or all of these circumstances can increase the risk of clogs.

I print a nozzle check on my PRO-4000 once or twice a week, if I'm not generating sufficient photographic output. But, alas, I'm now the victim of an error message telling me to replace the $675 printhead. I'm waiting until the day after my credit card monthly cycle closes before I order one.

How long has this printhead lasted and how much use did you get out of it? That's expensive to replace.

It lasted about 3 1/2 years. I don't ever seem to print as much as I would like to. But, when I do make large prints, I have total control, which I would never have if I used a service bureau to make my prints.

 

[Adam2]

Is a nozzle check good enough to maintain and prevent an inkjet printer from clogging?

I suspect that head clogging has more to do with the conditions a printer is kept in, usage patterns, ink, and manufacturer rather than specific approaches to trying to mitigate clogs. For example, I lived in the mid-Atlantic (humid) and Midwest (humid summers) and had a variety of Canon and Epson dye/pigment printers. The printers were always kept indoors in relatively constant temperatures (68-72 degrees F). The Canon dye printers heads tended to fail - it had nothing to do with clogging - more likely due to design. The Canon and Epson pigment printers didn't clog that much including the notorious Epson 3800/3880 and 4900 which would develop intermittent clogs when not used for periods of time (2 weeks to 6 months) but they would always clear after a couple of nozzle checks or in a rare case with the windex paper towel head treatment. The Canon pigment printers were less likely to clog though their heads were more prone to failure probably due to their thermal design versus the Epson piezoelectric approach. Quite frankly, I didn't worry about and still don't worry about clogs. It's just not worth my time and energy. Sorry to be such a curmudgeon.

 

[NAwlins Contrarian]

Is a nozzle check good enough to maintain and prevent an inkjet printer from clogging?

I suspect that head clogging has more to do with the conditions a printer is kept in, usage patterns, ink, and manufacturer rather than specific approaches to trying to mitigate clogs. For example, I lived in the mid-Atlantic (humid) and Midwest (humid summers) and had a variety of Canon and Epson dye/pigment printers. The printers were always kept indoors in relatively constant temperatures (68-72 degrees F). The Canon dye printers heads tended to fail - it had nothing to do with clogging - more likely due to design. The Canon and Epson pigment printers didn't clog that much including the notorious Epson 3800/3880 and 4900 which would develop intermittent clogs when not used for periods of time (2 weeks to 6 months) but they would always clear after a couple of nozzle checks or in a rare case with the windex paper towel head treatment. The Canon pigment printers were less likely to clog though their heads were more prone to failure probably due to their thermal design versus the Epson piezoelectric approach. Quite frankly, I didn't worry about and still don't worry about clogs. It's just not worth my time and energy.

I have a bunch of thoughts on this, but unfortunately I'm not aware of any published, high-quality engineering analysis on these issues. We have vague statements from manufacturers, user reports, anecdotes, and limited tests. Nevertheless, FWIW (maybe not much!), I suspect:

* From basic engineering principles, it seems very likely to me that the environment in which a printer is kept could have a large effect on how prone it is to clogging. Relative humidity, temperature, dustiness, and prevalence of electrostatic charges all seem like that could and sometimes would be significant factors.

* A significant fraction of what people call clogging is in fact some other process, the end result of which is that expected ink is not ejected into the desired place on the paper. Air getting into the system certainly seems like a real issue. There may well be others.

* That said, I also think that (at least with reasonably modern ink formulations) dye versus pigment is a real and sometimes important distinction, with dye-ink printers being substantially less susceptible to serious clogs (i.e., those that won't clear with one or two basic self-cleanings).

* Based on anecdotal trouble reports, I also suspect that using something other than original OEM ink cartridges with their original load of OEM ink substantially increases the risk of clogs or similar. Even if this suspicion is correct, I'm not well informed on the degree to which this higher rate of trouble is due to third-party inks, third-party cartridges, problematic modifications to OEM cartridges, engineering failures with CISS products, improper filling / refilling procedures, or what.

 

[Philip Eihuyar]

I have a bunch of thoughts on this, but unfortunately I'm not aware of any published, high-quality engineering analysis on these issues. We have vague statements from manufacturers, user reports, anecdotes, and limited tests. Nevertheless, FWIW (maybe not much!), I suspect:

* From basic engineering principles, it seems very likely to me that the environment in which a printer is kept could have a large effect on how prone it is to clogging. Relative humidity, temperature, dustiness, and prevalence of electrostatic charges all seem like that could and sometimes would be significant factors.

* A significant fraction of what people call clogging is in fact some other process, the end result of which is that expected ink is not ejected into the desired place on the paper. Air getting into the system certainly seems like a real issue. There may well be others.

This is what I have heard discussed in some detail also. It tends to happen in older Epson printers and is not so much dried nozzles but the ink withdrawing by capillary forces back into the nozzle and, if it goes too far, the printer cleaning will require several purges to get the ink back to the tip and printing again. [the latest Epsons redesigned and 'fixed' this] When a clog does not respond to cleaning cycles, it is sometimes a non sealed condition which is required to suck ink into the nozzle. Cleaning the seat with q-tips and ammonia solution will get the seal and vacuum back to normal.

* That said, I also think that (at least with reasonably modern ink formulations) dye versus pigment is a real and sometimes important distinction, with dye-ink printers being substantially less susceptible to serious clogs (i.e., those that won't clear with one or two basic self-cleanings).

One of the differences between Epson and Canon printers (pro printers) is in what happens in the cleaning cycles. In -for instance- my Canon Pro 10- is the print head containing the ink carts (a pigment printer) does an agitation rapid shaking back and forth of the printhead. This shakes up the particles which are suspended and will settle at the bottom of ink cart if not shaken up. Epson pro printers - so far as I know- do not do this agitation in their cleaning cycles in their pigment ink printers. The Canon printers do several other things in their regular cleaning cycles that Epson printers do not do such as cleaning the bottom of printhead and, I believe, the platen. A little more ink used in Canon printers but less concern for the user.

* Based on anecdotal trouble reports, I also suspect that using something other than original OEM ink cartridges with their original load of OEM ink substantially increases the risk of clogs or similar. Even if this suspicion is correct, I'm not well informed on the degree to which this higher rate of trouble is due to third-party inks, third-party cartridges, problematic modifications to OEM cartridges, engineering failures with CISS products, improper filling / refilling procedures, or what.

From reading over the years of the Epson 3880 and printers using that specific design, back to the R3000, some say they never had a problem and some -quite a few- reported really bad experiences of the same models. I suspect it is because of an inconsistency in the manufacturing - many users just got bad units and this resulted in leaky, cloggy printers. This is just my guess from reports here and in other printer forums.

 

[Vernon D Rainwater]

Is a nozzle check good enough to maintain and prevent an inkjet printer from clogging?

It may (or may not) but is definitely better (and more help) than doing nothing when printer is not used for any reasonable period of time.

 

[David Pavlich]

I do a nozzle check any time I'm in the basement (P800). Minimal ink and it gives the printer a bit of exercise. It seems to work for me.

David