Epson Stylus Photo PX710W printing in pink

[KG44]

i have an Epson Stylus Photo PX710W connected to an apple mac running OS Catalina that only seems to print in pink, if it prints anything at all. I've done all the diagnostics, nozzle and head cleans, as well as all the alignments. still no joy. Any tips?

 

[Ink stained Fingers]

Are you using original or 3rd party cartridges ? did this problem occur suddenly or did the print quality deterirate over time ? Could you please scan a nozzle check and post it here as a .jpg file - with the 'Attach files' function.

 

[KG44]

Are you using original or 3rd party cartridges ? did this problem occur suddenly or did the print quality deterirate over time ? Could you please scan a nozzle check and post it here as a .jpg file - with the 'Attach files' function.

yes, using 3rd party but have been for years with no probs until now. i would send a scan of the nozzle check, but when i did 1 there was nothing on the page.

 

[Ink stained Fingers]

I would assume you missed a button to load your image, if the file format would be wrong, or the file file too large, or whatever other error condition you should have seen an error notice by the forum software. Please try again.

 

[KG44]

I would assume you missed a button to load your image, if the file format would be wrong, or the file file too large, or whatever other error condition you should have seen an error notice by the forum software. Please try again.

sorry, i meant there was nothing on the print nozzle check page.

 

[Ink stained Fingers]

PX710W printing in pink

nothing at all anymore ? - not even pink ?

Can you change one of the cartridges to a new one and run another nozzle check to see if there are at least a few lines visible . And an additional cleaning cycle to see if the printout for that color normalizes. Please make sure that possible plastic stripes are removed from the cartridge which cover up a vent hole. You may poke with a needle into that vent hole (if it's a 3rd party cartridge, an Epson cartridge for your model may have such tape as well, I'm not so familiar with this one).
Did the problem occur at once - e.g. after changing the cartridge supplier - or some technical malfunction ?

 

[websnail]

Also, check the flexible tubing that runs to the printhead...

Chances are high that you'll see what look like breaks in the colour along each of the tubes or lack of colour in some... A photo of that tubing would be useful as that's easier to interpret but basically any "breaks" are air in the feed tubing and clearing that requires access to a utility that can perform an "ink charge". You'd also need a set of cartridges that were definitely full, feeding properly with clear vent channels, etc... as the process uses a fair amount of ink.

 

[james3]

Great suggestion, indeed I have a Epson Photo Stylus PX820FWD that is very similar and using 3rd party cartridge it can happen that the tubes that bring ink to the print head have some air inside, that breaks, and if this happens be sure that that color will not print well or not print at all!! This happening to me with 3rd party cartridge so I'm currently thinking to install a CISS to have always full cartridges in the printer, so this should avoid the system to suck air
About fixing the air problem, I always used the clear nozzle procedure and once I disassembled the tubes on the print-head an I primed with some print-head cleaner solution each of 6 channel before riassemble, what about the "ink charge" solution ? Maybe the maintenance program that reset the waste ink counter is able to do that ?

 

[websnail]

so I'm currently thinking to install a CISS to have always full cartridges in the printer, so this should avoid the system to suck air
About fixing the air problem,

One thing to watch out for with CIS systems is that they slowly ingest tiny amounts of air into the cartridge/buffer end which eventually lead to air ingress into the printers own internal CIS system. So worth keeping an eye on the ink flow into the cartridges and doing a little re-priming on the CIS system every once in a while.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MbDewWm57hM

what about the "ink charge" solution ? Maybe the maintenance program that reset the waste ink counter is able to do that ?

The "Ink charge" function on the WICReset tool doesn't actually run the proper function if memory serves (it was running just a printhead clean which isn't sufficient to do a charge) but you may be able to get hold of the official AdjProg service utility for the same purpose.

Worth noting that the disassembly video I did way too long ago, is now something I wouldn't recommend unless all other approaches had failed and then only if you have some absorbent material to hand to catch the ink flow from the head when you disconnect. In particular you want to protect the electronics ribbon cable and circuit board connection that runs into the printhead as ink into that causes no end of problems.

 

[james3]

Ok thanks for the updated, indeed I followed that video to prime again the cartridge, plus the tubes were kind of pressurized and luckily there were not too much ink inside them, since they were full of air, and seems that nothing went into the electronics, at least until now the printer is keep printing so I assume I have been lucky, if in case I'll need to disassemble those tubes again I just discovered that the Epson Adjprogram has a function to depressurize those hoses and empty them from the ink so it won't be a mess again.

anyway about the air that flows from the CISS to the cartridge I was just looking at the chinese Aliexpress market and seems that they solved this issue with these valves that I never seen before and that have a similar/same design with the valve that is installed into the original T080 and T079 cartridges, I thinks that, if these valves do what they promise, they should keep my CISS and cartridges air free

The other problem now is about the inks,my printer supports Claria inks and with those inks it printed flawlessly, digging into forum seems that the only big printer that uses the same Claria dye ink are the Fujifilm frontier printer but you need then to make LC and LM since they use only 4 colors, the other alternative imho would be to use some other original Epson ink bottle, butI don't thin they are Claria but just Epson genuine Dye