Epson Workforce refillable carts for the new precisionCore Series

cls · Oct 25, 2014

hi..
I use the 3640 since end of august and I have various issues
ink flow

I took some fotos from the cartriges. (see attached)

What happens if i print heavy on one spesicic color it just runs out of ink, the ink flow is somehow interrupted

I then have to manual inject ink into the intake directy in the printhead to get it working without 2 cleaning cycles
any ideas?

turbguy · Oct 25, 2014

NEVER let an Epson printer run out of ink. To do so will introduce air into the printhead system, which can be difficult to expel.

NEVER let a Canon printer run out of ink. To do so WILL cause an overheating condition, and WILL damage the nozzles and sensitive electronics contained in the printhead.

The printer's firmware should prevent that in an Epson if you refill sufficiently, else interrupt printing and top off the cart(s) with ink using you best judgement.

Most Canon printers are built with an optical "out-of-ink" system that should warn when ink runs low, but it is still wise to top off those carts, at the first warning, too.

Nothing else to say...

martin0reg · Oct 25, 2014

If it happens always with the same cart, you would know it's this cart...but I think you are that smart..
If it happens always with that cart which color is on heavy use, my only explanation would be the whole set.
I have refillables only for R285, but I can say that refillables have a rather complicated design for ink AND air flow. Strange things happened while cleaning a clogged head, therefor letting the head rest on the purge pad filled with water/ckeaning solution: with open air holes two of the six were running empty over night...I can not say why only these two, while the other four were stil full. And I definitly could not say how the ink is flowing through these confusing ink and air channels..
PS: Be aware of that special chamber which leads to the outllet...often round an in the middle (like on your photos), sometimes at the bottom behind a silver screen (like mine for R285). Your carts seem to have round ones in the middle, and these probably have to be "primed" to fill this chamber. Some users recommend priming with vacuum..

pharmacist · Oct 27, 2014

Hi Serhat,

the large black cartridge must be primed !!! It looks like the R3000 cartridges. The compartment directly above the ink outlet valve must be full of ink after priming. Do not forget to remove the plug closing the breathing hole in the cartridge.

cls · Oct 27, 2014

Yes sure I prime the Cartriges all of them, all outlet chambers are full of ink after priming. the Air hole is wide open when printing but some how on heavy duty pritning the ink channels somehow run empty sporadicaly.

Epson changed the cleaning cylce for the WF36X and WF7X series with the precision core printhead you can now individually select purge black or purge color

The Hat · Oct 27, 2014

It sounds to me like you have a damaged or duff cartridge, that's why it failing to continue to deliver ink on heavy usage.

Change the cartridge or get a totally new brand of cartridge !

mikling · Feb 16, 2015

There are at least thousands of these floating around by now. The issue with these as I have discovered is that the design is good the manufacture is bad on the runs from July to at least December 2014.
I was testing these and ran into an exact similar problem this weekend.
The issue is that the heat welded layer on the side with the serpentince pattern was welded too long or too hot. As a result, the tunnel is blocked at some point. One way around it is to put a pinhole at the upper point and determine if bypasses the blockage. To test if it does, pull on a syringe at the refill port. If that does not create a vacuum, problem solved but do not fill ink higher than where the pin hole is.

A second way around this is to drill a hole, use a rubber plug and insert a 20 gauge or smaller needle thropugh the plug so that it reaches to the bottom of the cartridge. This is a dip tube. This needle will serve as the air intake just like a mariotte bottle system. Trim the needle that protrudes above the cartridge. All will be fine now.

To test if the cartridge is affected by this,use a syringe and pump air into the cartridge with the refill port empty. If there is resistance, then the cartridge is affected. You need to resort to either of the two remedies.

Now what is surprising is the op was using this cartridge since the end of August 2014. My samples arrived in December 2014. They are affected. I finally got around to this this weekend....two months behind my schedule.

Now just think about this for a sec. Imagine the amount of stock floating around that are affected by this! This is one reason I refuse to jump into new things.........bleeding edge. 4 months later and the problem still persisted .

I wonder now......how long it will take to "remove" the manufactured stock that is floating around?

Later this year I will make a video explaining what the functionality of all those items are in the refillable cartridges. They are all there for a reason and once you understand it, trouble shooting is more straightforward.