Experiences and thoughts after working on Epson 9880

InkjetMall Customer Support Printer Maintenance & Cartridges
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I’ll keep this as brief as possible, but I thought it would be nice to offer my experiences here for those who, like I did are thinking of working on their printer but are intimidated by it.

I bought a 9880 used to turn into a K7 printer. It was a relatively good deal, and had been used but not abused. When it showed up though there was a clogged magenta line, no ink was going thought it at all. I won’t go into all the details, but with some research and Dana at Inkjetmall’s guidance I assumed I had a clogged damper, so with a downloaded service manual, more of Dana’s guidance, and a quiet afternoon I gave it a shot and replaced the printers dampers (I did this at the time of my K7 conversion). It was an extra $200 in parts. It completely solved the magenta clog, and suddenly the printer looked to have a lot of life in it. I was elated.

Then I kept getting minor clogs. Nothing a normal cleaning wouldn’t solve, but they were happening every night - too often. Everything I read pointed at the wiper bladed and/or capping station needing replacement. The wiper is a $4 part, but to replace it I’d have to take the right side of the printer apart. I figured I might as well replace the capping station/pump mechanism and the Flushing station too if I take the time to get the printer apart again. It’s another $150 in parts or so (ordered from Compass Micro), but with this done it’d give me a printer that was essentially serviced for the next 3+ years. Again, I asked around, and Dana offered wonderful guidance and support. I went for it. It was easy.

Best part, I’ve not had a head clog, even a minor one, since I did this.

I’m telling all of this b/c I’m not an epson tech, nor a mechanic of any sort, and doing this work was extremely intimidating for me, but once I got into the printer and realized how simple these things are to work on and how if you’ve some time and patience it can all be DIY. The only tools I needed were a long phillips screwdriver (pref magnetic), and a pair of needle nose pliers. That’s it. What I did would have been $2k or so from a repair tech here in NYC.

Point being, don’t be scared of giving it a go and working on your printer if you’re relatively mechanically competent and have a bit of patience.

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Thanks for your feedback regarding printer repair, and I’m glad to hear your printer is now working beautifully after replacing these parts.
You have not only saved a lot of $, but learned a great deal about your printer- and gained confidence in working on it yourself by following the Epson repair manual!

Best regards and happy printing~ Dana :slight_smile: