From: googlenospam on 14 Apr 2010 05:09 I have an Epson Stylus pro XL that I use as backup for when my laser printer packs up. Now I need to put it into mothballs again. It was not used for 4 years and I was surprised when it kicked into life eventually with new cartridges. What is the best way of keeping the cartridges nice and fluid if unused for a long time, apart from using it and cleaning it every month........
From: Jan Alter on 14 Apr 2010 07:54 Until a couple of years ago, when I retired, I took care of our seven dozen Epson inkjets at school. During the 10 weeks of summer vacation I had each printer put into a plastic trash bag (expelling most of the air) with a moist sponge, and tied with a rubber band, then placed in a closet, or covered with a sheet. Over ten years I never lost one due to clogging. Your situation for storage though sounds as if it would stretch into several years. Epson says an unopened cartridge has a lifespan of 2 years and just 6 months when its placed into the printer. Reasoning for the 6 months is oxidation, fluid vehicle evaporation and thickening of the ink, which can cause a head clog. So, if you intend to keep your printer tucked away for a year or more I would be removing the ink cartridges entirely and replacing them with a cleaning cartridge for each color. Once the cleaning cartridges are in the printer I would do enough printing as to get the cleaning fluid to entirely replace the ink inside the printhead. At that point I would use the same procedure that I use for storing the printers for the summer vacation.On the other hand you simply put your printer away last time and then took it out after 4 years and it worked. Sounds pretty amazing. Maybe it would work again if you were lucky. P.S. If you wanted to make your own cleaning cartridges fill them with 90% isopropyl alcohol / 10% ammonia combination. -- Jan Alter bearpuf(a)verizon.net <googlenospam(a)hotmail.co.uk> wrote in message news:967f55d0-3680-497b-9930-17fe211fe96c(a)v20g2000yqv.googlegroups.com... >I have an Epson Stylus pro XL that I use as backup for when my laser > printer packs up. Now I need to put it into mothballs again. It was > not used for 4 years and I was surprised when it kicked into life > eventually with new cartridges. What is the best way of keeping the > cartridges nice and fluid if unused for a long time, apart from using > it and cleaning it every month........ >
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