Epson 7800 No Ink Printing After After Replacing Dampers

General
1

I have an Epson 7800 that I got new in 2006. I am an artist, not a high volume print shop, but that is still a pretty old workhorse! For years I had intermittent printing problems that I treated as blocked print head nozzles. Six months ago I realized that it was actually a blocked dampers problem, and replaced the whole set. I haven’t been able to get it to print since then! I have fiddled with loosening and tightening the caps on the dampers with my fingertips until I’ve gone mad. Made quite a few huge messes with leaking ink. I replaced the ink pump/capping station. I removed the damper assembly and found that it had not been assembled correctly, so I assembled it correctly and made sure everything snapped into place where it ought to. (About 2 years ago, I replaced the vacuum pump in the back of the machine. It had not been printing, but it worked well after that replacement until I replaced the dampers.)
I really thought when I discovered that I had not assembled and installed the damper assembly correctly that I had found my problem! Once I had installed it correctly, I thought I would be back to printing in no time, but not a drop of ink pulls through. When I ran an Initial Fill, I could see ink running through the tubes behind the ink pump/capping station. When I let the print head sit on a wet paper towel for a few hours, the paper towel came out with all different colors of ink on it! But when I try to print a nozzle check or some purging stripes, not a drop of ink is on the paper!
Is there some issue I have missed? Does anyone have any ideas that might help me make a breakthrough?
Thanks,
New Orleans Artist MOUSIE
www.MOUSIE.com

2

Anybody experienced this before? All colors of ink on wet towel under print head, but no ink printing? Anybody?

3

What did you do to purge the air out of the ink lines when you disconnected everything?

4

I pulled ink through the bottom side of the dampers with a syringe before I snapped the assembly back onto the print head. When I let the print head sit on a paper towel wet with print head cleaner, it comes out with all colors of ink on it now which it did not before when I had the assembly wonky, so it seems as if ink is now in the print head. I ran a simple cleaning today, and shone a flashlight on the tubes behind the ink pump/capping station and I could see ink going through the tubes, but could it be just not STRONG enough suction? Maybe the vacuum pump in the back of the unit needs to be replaced again? Or could there be some kind of vacuum lock, and if so, how do you fix it?

5

Did you run one or two power cleans to pull out any air or just a simple cleaning? If your capping station seal is not clean it may not be making a good enough seal around the print head to actually pull.

6

I ran the Initial Ink Fill a few times. I started Initial Fill and suddenly got an Ink Cartridge Error on a cart that was installed. Reset that cart, the Error moved to two different carts, etc., etc, like a game of whack-a-mole. Finally, the Initial Fill started again, got up to about 80%, and the Ink Cartridge Error started again, switching from cart to cart. Every now and then, the Initial Fill would start again but would always start over at 0%. This went on about 4 times before the Initial fill completed uninterrupted. I replaced the ink pump/capping station this summer, and I keep it really clean. Spritz it with water occasionally and wipe it with a large lint free swab. The seal should be good on that.
Thank you so much for responding to this! I appreciate your time and thought!~ MOUSIE