printer maintenance

My Epson CX6400 hasn't been printing properly for a while. This weekend I got around to taking it apart to see what was up. The usual story with inkjets is that the waste ink tubes get clogged. I was unable to find a service manual for free online, so I just dived in with screwdriver and needle-nose pliers.

It took me a while to figure out exactly how to dismantle the whole thing: lacking a manual I had to experiment with looking around, seeing which screws connected which parts, and pulling things. After about half an hour I managed to get it safely stripped down.
Printer innards
The base of the printer contained the waste ink pipe, leading to a sludge trap. It was sealed off with wedges of felt.
Waste ink pipe
Believe it or not, this next picture is after cleaning. I wasn't looking to restore it to factory condition, merely to unclog the tube and clean most of the ink residue.
Waste ink area after cleaning
The next job was to clean the waste ink tube in the chassis section. It seemed to be curled inside a plastic housing, so I was limited to cleaning either end, which I did.
Waste ink tube: chassis end

End result: it still doesn't print properly. Oh well. Perhaps a laser? I'm fed up with inkjets.

1 comment

  1. Yum, yum! Printer innards!

    One method of keeping inkjet printers printing is to automation. Schedule a print job every day. You can use the same piece of paper 4 times if the print job covers only half a sheet.

    That's what we do at the office since we tend to do big jobs and then the printer is ideal for weeks at a time.

    (http://livejournal.com/users/sylvene)

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