Epson Photo Stylus 1400 Reset

[rckowal]

I have been using a CIS for several years problem free, then I ran into the "Service Required" issue. It was easy enough to reset the waste ink counter using the Epson utility provided for this job. Concurrently, I removed the CIS ink cartridge set to do "some house cleaning" inside of the carraige.

After re-installing them, the printer will not recognize the CIS cartridges that worked well until the waste ink reset. To see if the printer would recognize OEM Epson cartridges; I installed an old (2 - 3 year) set that I had on hand. It would not recognize them as well, even though they had the OEM chips on them.

What's going on here? Will I need to reset the CIS ink cartridge chips with a manual resetting tool, or do some thing else? How about the old cartridges, can they be reset with the same resetting tool?

Best regards, Richard

 

[mikling]

What "house cleaning" was done?

I need the details.

 

[rckowal]

What "house cleaning" was done?

I need the details.

Thanks for replying Mikling. Are these the "details" you need? Just so you're aware, I have done such cleanings a number of times before on this & other Epson printers (including Epson 700, 1200, 1270) as well.

Old ink inside of the carriage as well as on the cartridge chip contacts were gently cleaned with commercial cleaning solution & ear swabs. Wire chip contacts were not bent or damaged in the process.

Sponge in the ink parking pad was flushed with cleaning solution into the waste ink tank. Paper rail was cleaned of dust & some old ink accumulation.

Regards, Richard

 

[pharmacist]

Did you install a waste ink bottle by redirecting the internal waste ink tube into this bottle to keep the internal absorption sponge as clean as possible ? This is very important for Epson printers.

 

[rckowal]

Did you install a waste ink bottle by redirecting the internal waste ink tube into this bottle to keep the internal absorption sponge as clean as possible ? This is very important for Epson printers.

Yes! But if you know, how would that affect recognition of the ink cartridges?

Regards, Richard

 

[pharmacist]

No, it should not. However: I also have an Epson 1400 and I am now currently testing two types of CISS (one from Colorgraph.com (dye) and one from Inkrepublic.com).

I am now testing the dye based Colorgraph.com's version and I am actually quite impressed by the print quality and vibrance of the refill ink. I believe I only paid about 37.- (about $45). I was rather sceptic about the ink quality (low vibrancy, small gamut). The first prints are actually very impressive with the canned profiles and B/W prints do suffer much less from the greenish tinge which is very visible with the original Epson Claria dye ink. Not sure about the fade resistance, but I am now doing some real world fading tests (will report back in a few month time). Back to your problem: I too had some problems with the chips being recognized by the printer and I discovered I had to press really hard to fit the chips to make contact with the printer's electronic circuit. Did you press the cartridges deep enough into the printer ?

The Epson 1400 is very easy to reset (Websnail has this utility for download on his website). Have a try.

 

[websnail]

...I have done such cleanings a number of times before on this & other Epson printers (including Epson 700, 1200, 1270) as well.

Old ink inside of the carriage as well as on the cartridge chip contacts were gently cleaned with commercial cleaning solution & ear swabs. Wire chip contacts were not bent or damaged in the process.

If I was to guess I'd say that it was the wire chip contact cleaning that's most likely the problem...

There may be something shorting out the wires (eg: fluid that's tracked down the wire into the circuit board / flat cable) or possible some unnoticed damage.

As I said it's a "guess" but given the fact that the printer is no longer recognising any cart chips (including OEM) it's a pretty likely one.



Next up I'd have to ask which utility you used to reset the waste ink counter... Was one specifically for the 1400 or one that was for the 1390 or 1410? If either of the latter, how did you reset?

Reason I ask on this point is that some folks have reinitialised the whole printer EEPROM and ended up with a printer that thinks it's a different model and therefore won't accept the local cartridge chips...


My money is on those contact wires though...

 

[mikling]

The problem you are having is that this generation of printer is different from the other ones you worked on because there are an additional two contacts on the cartridge and carrier. These two contacts are there because the OEM cart has a liquid sensor that works by detecting if there is ink at the bottom of the cartridge just before the internal pickup. On OEM cartridges this liquid sensor looks to be a capacitance or possibly resistance sensor. No aftermarket chips have this sensor built onto their bodies. What they do is emulate the sensor so that a similar reading is produced as when the OEM cartridge is sensing liquid.

I fully suspected that you had messed around with liquids around the contacts as that is most likely the cause for failure or the printer not recognizing the cartridge. The issue is not really that it is not recognizing the cartridge per se but it is not recognizing the values of the readings it is getting across the two contacts that connect to the liquid sensor. Simply put the liquid you messed around with is causing readings across the two sense points that are now out of range. Your best bet is to carefully wipe the areas AROUND the contacts dry and/ or get a can of compressed air and attempt to blow the liquid that you had worked with away from the contacts or dry them out. These contacts can be removed if you are careful and know what you are doing. If you are not, you will destroy the contact carriers whilst trying to remove them. So you are warned.

In all likelihood it has not burnt anything out as we are not dealing with high currents at all. If it doesn't dry out by itself, then get the can of air and blast away but make sure that you don't blast into the ink intake spigots. I would also hope that the residue can dry sufficiently from blowing. I don't know what type of cleaning fluid was used.

It's got nothing to do with waste ink bottles or anything else. The internal absorption sponge is totally passive and everything about that relating to electrical issues are an old wive's tale. And ditch that commercial cleaning cleaning fluid you used around the wire contacts. Slightly moistened swabs with normal water would have done exactly the same cleaning without potential residues.... Residue is the key word here. I hope that the air will dry it off or change the capacitance /resistance sufficiently to bring the readings back to accepted levels.

I clean my internal sponge by FLOODING the whole tank with water, that's right, FLOODING it and then vacuum out the water and ink. I repeat this many times to rinse it but then I have a high powered vacuum arrangement that will literally suck the absorption sponge dry from the bottom. This has no ill effect on the printer and I do not need an external waste ink tank or need to disassemble the printer.

Websnails utility is linked to my initial posting on this forum offering the utility to members

 

[rckowal]

The problem you are having is that this generation of printer is different from the other ones you worked on because there are an additional two contacts on the cartridge and carrier. These two contacts are there because the OEM cart has a liquid sensor that works by detecting if there is ink at the bottom of the cartridge just before the internal pickup. On OEM cartridges this liquid sensor looks to be a capacitance or possibly resistance sensor. No aftermarket chips have this sensor built onto their bodies. What they do is emulate the sensor so that a similar reading is produced as when the OEM cartridge is sensing liquid.

I fully suspected that you had messed around with liquids around the contacts as that is most likely the cause for failure or the printer not recognizing the cartridge. The issue is not really that it is not recognizing the cartridge per se but it is not recognizing the values of the readings it is getting across the two contacts that connect to the liquid sensor. Simply put the liquid you messed around with is causing readings across the two sense points that are now out of range. Your best bet is to carefully wipe the areas AROUND the contacts dry and/ or get a can of compressed air and attempt to blow the liquid that you had worked with away from the contacts or dry them out. These contacts can be removed if you are careful and know what you are doing. If you are not, you will destroy the contact carriers whilst trying to remove them. So you are warned.

In all likelihood it has not burnt anything out as we are not dealing with high currents at all. If it doesn't dry out by itself, then get the can of air and blast away but make sure that you don't blast into the ink intake spigots. I would also hope that the residue can dry sufficiently from blowing. I don't know what type of cleaning fluid was used.

It's got nothing to do with waste ink bottles or anything else. The internal absorption sponge is totally passive and everything about that relating to electrical issues are an old wive's tale. And ditch that commercial cleaning cleaning fluid you used around the wire contacts. Slightly moistened swabs with normal water would have done exactly the same cleaning without potential residues.... Residue is the key word here. I hope that the air will dry it off or change the capacitance /resistance sufficiently to bring the readings back to accepted levels.

I clean my internal sponge by FLOODING the whole tank with water, that's right, FLOODING it and then vacuum out the water and ink. I repeat this many times to rinse it but then I have a high powered vacuum arrangement that will literally suck the absorption sponge dry from the bottom. This has no ill effect on the printer and I do not need an external waste ink tank or need to disassemble the printer.

Websnails utility is linked to my initial posting on this forum offering the utility to members

Thanks for the very helpful reply. I'll try the things you suggested.

However, there are some things I failed to mention - which may help in diagnosing the problem here.

1. Every time I start the printer up, the red ink "empty" light comes on & the carraige stops to flag empty cartridge status. The status monitor indicates which of the cartridges are OK, but there are always some that aren't (the X "empty" sign).

2. If I remove cartridges & re-install them - either OEM, refillables &/or third party CIS; the empties vs. OK colors some times change. To clarify: removing a cartridge set from the carriage then immediately reinstalling it. Nothing else done - restart printer & the status of the various color cartridges changes (doesn't consistently repeat the previous status).

3. The CIS I'm using is several years old so I'm not sure that it has auto reset chips in the cartridges. Recalling (vaguely) the initial installation, I had to have the OEM cartridges installed & working. Then I had to pull the OEM's & install the CIS. If I didn't, the printer wouldn't recognize the CIS chips.

By the way, the cleaning solution is (I believe) a mix of 2 parts Windex window cleaner & 1 part alcohol. Since cleaning was done several weeks ago, it's unlikely that there is any damp or wet residue on or around the cartridge contacts. Possibly, there could be some ink or other residue on the backside of the contact board, but it seems unlikely.

Best regards, Richard

 

[rckowal]

...I have done such cleanings a number of times before on this & other Epson printers (including Epson 700, 1200, 1270) as well.

Old ink inside of the carriage as well as on the cartridge chip contacts were gently cleaned with commercial cleaning solution & ear swabs. Wire chip contacts were not bent or damaged in the process.

If I was to guess I'd say that it was the wire chip contact cleaning that's most likely the problem...

There may be something shorting out the wires (eg: fluid that's tracked down the wire into the circuit board / flat cable) or possible some unnoticed damage.

As I said it's a "guess" but given the fact that the printer is no longer recognising any cart chips (including OEM) it's a pretty likely one.



Next up I'd have to ask which utility you used to reset the waste ink counter... Was one specifically for the 1400 or one that was for the 1390 or 1410? If either of the latter, how did you reset?

Reason I ask on this point is that some folks have reinitialised the whole printer EEPROM and ended up with a printer that thinks it's a different model and therefore won't accept the local cartridge chips...


My money is on those contact wires though...

I used the Epson software utility for the 1400, downloaded from Epsons web site. Although it may be redundant, is there any way to set the EEPROM back to it's factory default? I have the Epson Adjust software, if it is needed.

I'll go back to inspect & clean the wire contacts again. Additionally, I'll look around for obvious damage. I would say that there is a chance that ink, other residue or corrosion may be present in the ribbon cable where it plugs into the wire contact circuit board. Should it be necessary, I have the service manual & skills to remove that board & cable to clean them up.

Best regards, Richard