Cool trick! How to do nozzle checks as a scheduled task

[stratman]

It’s alright PeterBJ, stratman is still trying to join me in Orbit, He’ll get there eventfully…

Not with the MP830.

 

[PeterBJ]

That is the fact. The MP830 does not have this "Auto on/off" button. If you click on Help while on the Maintenance tab you may see as I do

Auto Power <Applicable Models Only>

I also have an MP540 installed, which I forgot to check. Checking the maintenance tab for this printer shows that it too only has the power off button, no auto power setting. Clicking help shows the same message in blue text, that this function only applies relevant models.

 

[The Hat]

All of my dye printers both A4/A3 have the power on with the print function and off with a timed delay.

But none of my pigment printer has this power on function at all, only the timed delay off function.

 

[Smile]

Do NOT just use your UPS to cut power to a printer that is turned on. Use the printer's off button (or this software one if available) so that the print head moves over and parks directly above/on the purge pads.

After a certain amount of time passes the printer will not do any "housekeeping (maybe parking the print heads?)" because it's already done doing that. Every printer parks the heads when done printing after a while. The off button initiates a cleaning cycle before turning off. This cycle is omitted if the printer was standing idle for some time because it was already done.

Tested on my IP6700D, ip1600, MP250.

 

[Roger in Phuket]

So much useful information in this thread! Thanks to all for posting.

 

[hceuterpe]

I managed to fire off the nozzle check manually in Linux through the command line.
To do that, I just had to run:
lpr -o raw 00004.SPL -P Canon-PIXMA-MP610
"Canon-PIXMA-MP610" is what I named my printer as in CUPS. The MP610 I own is also connected to a cheap Trendnet 3-port print server so it is networked. I had to pull the raw spool file of the nozzle check in Windows, as the original posting noted. It should be easy to create a cron job with that single line. I modified my crontab with:

0 0 */3 * * root run-parts /etc/cron.nozzlecheck
And stuck a bash script with that command inside that directory, and did a chmod +x to make it executable. That cron syntax means to run this on every day that is divisible by three, at midnight. So it will run normally every 3 days, and I calculate at most every 4 days as you approach the month boundaries...

Incidentally, this also happens to be the ONLY way I know of to get a nozzle check to print at all in Linux

 

[crenedecotret]

Thanks hceuterpe... i've been using Linux for the last couple of years now.. this is very very good to know I will try it out

 

[crenedecotret]

just for fun, I re-read the entire thread. If anyone is still wondering after so many years why I was using LPT3: is that it's a port which typically does not physically exist on any computer. In the old DOS days, LPT1: was the port used for old parallel connection printers. All versions of windows allow remapping LPT#: to a network shared printer (even WIndows 3.11 I think)... my guess is to use legacy dos software. Once LPT3: is mapped, it can be used like a DOS device/file. We are basically tricking the computer into thinking there is a printer attached on the parallel port

You could probably send a text file directly to the printer by doing this
COPY test.txt LPT3:
for nozzle checks, we just send raw data from the windows spool directory captured on it way out through the USB port.

or even use your printer like a typewriter (somewhat) by trying this
COPY CON LPT3:
(type in whatever you want, and hit CTRL-Z, Enter)

 

[hceuterpe]

I've been running the Linux variant of this for months now. It works wonderfully. Definitely think this will extend the longevity of my print head, it's my fourth one! The third one lasted like 9 months!


I love back in the day that parallel ports used the exact same pin-count form factor as SCSI and sometimes even serial ports.
A throwback moment : pins, stupidly huge connector, even more stupidly thick cable! Ah, those were the days...

 

[Smile]

Another good free opensource utility:
http://www.codeproject.com/Articles/32239/Keep-Your-InkJet-Print-Head-Clean