How do I repair an Epson ecotank L4160 not printing colors after color cartridges left empty for 1 year?

[aiglesh]

I moved from middle east to uk a year back and all color cartridges became empty just after moving. I did not have colored ink so I started to print as grey scale only as I still had black ink with me. Got a bit busy and did not buy colored ink until few days back. I filled the colored ink but now it will not print any color. Tried nozzle check and head cleaning so many times, power wash once but no success. In color mode it prints only black and leaves the rest of colors unprinted. Any solutions pls? I guess the colored inks have dried somewhere and blocked some parts of it. Am I right? Thanks

 

[Ink stained Fingers]

There are 2 ssections you need to take care of - the tubing - the ink supply lines to the printheads - and the printheads themselves.
I'm not familiar with your specific tank system model, you need to disengage the printhead - pull the power plug shortly after a start up, the printhead is covered up with a milky white piece of plastic held with a very few screws, remove this cover to get access to the dampers which are seated in the printhead carriage in place of the regular cartridges, you can pull those out as you would normally do , and you get access to the ink receptacles.

Follow the instructions of this video, there are plenty more about the subject how to clean an Epson printhead

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IszUNL7znds

Use a syringe , insert it into the ink outlet of the dampers and slowly try to pull ink through the tubes, there is a little round chamber which should be filled about half. And then reassemble everything.


Edit: