printhead cleaning

[Steve Holden]

Hi Martin, I run a couple of Encad 850 machines and I clean the heads using a piece of lint free cloth and distilled water. If it’s really clogged I fold a piece of kitchen roll and put it in a small dish (I wanted to say saucer there but I can’t spell it). Next fully soak the kitchen roll with lukewarm water and place the cartridge on it with the jets down, after a short while you should see the colour of the ink flowing into the kitchen roll. Then dry with a piece of lint free.
Hope this helps

Steve

[Martin Pearson]

Thanks for the advice Steve but I would expect it to take a bit more than that to clean the heads as the machine hasn’t been used for a few years. Not even sure if I will be able to get it going again after the length of time it has been sitting about doing nothing but worth a try. Funny enough it is an encad 850 :lol1:

[Jason Xuereb]

Will our solvent cleaning fluid damage the heads?

[Martin Pearson]

Jason, I don’t know which is why I was asking for some advice. I read somewhere that IPA might dry out rubber so was reluctant to give that a go on it’s own.
Found an article on the net about using Sainsbury’s bathroom cleaner with 5% IPA added so might give that a try. At the moment I have nothing to lose.

[Sean Warburton]

I wonder if an ultrasonic bath might be ideal for cleaning them?

[David Rowland]

i recently used an ultrasonic on jv3 heads but i used the cleaning solution, well basically i screwed the head up and melted it, was too much for it.

used sonics before and worked ok, just this time i should have used a nicer solution

[Justin Williams]

quote Martin:

OK quick question, does anyone have any recommendations for print head cleaning fluids for ink jet printers using dye and pigmented inks. Want to see if I can get my printer sorted and printing again over the next few weeks and the heads are bound to be clogged up.

Hi, i was told that if you leave them in small amount of luke warm water overnight in a cup or something, then that will unclog them.

Jus

[David Rowland]

my worry was using water… i thought u realy need something without water in it

[Martin Pearson]

Dave don’t forget my printer is dye/pigment inks so just using water would probably be OK, have read a few bits on the net where people have just used like warm water but with the length of time this has been stood doing nothing then I doubt it will work.

Wouldn’t know about using just water for your solvent heads but there is a wide range of cleaning solutions available for ultrasonic cleaners. You shouldn’t have to much trouble finding something suitable. It’s then just a case of making sure you don’t leave them in to long and possibly adjusting temperature to suit.

I have read a bit about using ultrasonics for cleaning heads and will look into that a bit more if I can get this printer up and running again.

[Chris Wool]

martin

if they are pigmented inks you will be hard pushed to free them
if dye inks the warm water as described, or down to cartridge world for a tub of, desk top printer cleaning fluid.

jewelery ultrasonic cleaner did work for us some years ago.

chris

[David Rowland]

more concerned about metals in the heads with the use of water… i dont know

[Martin Pearson]

Chris, I thought that might be the case but as I have nothing to lose thought I would give it a try.

Dave you can buy a solution for cleaning printed circuit boards and soft metals so I can’t see that being a problem with the printheads.

[Chris Wool]

quote Dave Rowland:

more concerned about metals in the heads with the use of water… i dont know

dave, martin is talking about water based inks and is how we were told to clean the encads etc.

chris