Cyan print areas on Epson R3000 B&Ws: Do you own an Epson Stylus Photo R3000 printer? I'm trying to figure out why black & white photos are printing with cyan colour in some areas.

DebAnn Loc: Toronto

Do you own an Epson Stylus Photo R3000 printer? I'm trying to figure out why black & white photos are printing with cyan colour in some areas. This is a very bad print - I photographed the print using my cell phone. But it shows what's happening.

I cleaned the print head and did a head realignment. The ink cartridges all appear to have ink.

Thanks

(Download)

olsonsview

I had a 3000 many years ago, it was a great printer in its day. By looking at your print I would not think cleaning the head is necessary. I believe the problem is located in your file that you are printing. When converted to B&W it still is retaining cyan information, and trying to print select areas with cyan ink! The cyan is not random by any means which may be expected with a faulty head.Make sure the file has no remaining color information. SO look at your method of converting the color image to BW.

Richard Engelmann Loc: Boulder, Colorado

You might look at the printer settings as you prepare to print. B&W might be an option that would eliminate any color ink.

DebAnn Loc: Toronto

Richard Engelmann wrote:

You might look at the printer settings as you prepare to print. B&W might be an option that would eliminate any color ink.

That photo was printed using the B&W option. The first 2 prints I did that day were perfect. The 3rd one came out as posted.

DebAnn Loc: Toronto

olsonsview wrote:

I had a 3000 many years ago, it was a great printe... (show quote)

That's not it. I've been printing B&W images on this printer for years, using the Advanced B&W and Matte Black Ink (Ultra Premium Matte paper). I had just printed two perfect prints. The third and subsequent prints had this cyan problem.

BobHartung Loc: Bettendorf, IA

DebAnn wrote:

Do you own an Epson Stylus Photo R3000 printer? I'm trying to figure out why black & white photos are printing with cyan colour in some areas. This is a very bad print - I photographed the print using my cell phone. But it shows what's happening.

I cleaned the print head and did a head realignment. The ink cartridges all appear to have ink.

Thanks

Oops, ignore. I just saw the above posts.

If printing in B&W you need to be using Epson's Advanced Black and White printing mode.

DebAnn Loc: Toronto

BobHartung wrote:

Oops, ignore. I just saw the above posts.

If printing in B&W you need to be using Epson's Advanced Black and White printing mode.

Yes, I know that. This is not a "print choice" problem.

Pablo8 Loc: Nottingham UK.

Have you done a 'Nozzle check print-out before or after the Cyan -contaminated 'Advanced B&W' print? Might give some indication to the Cyan fault. Did you choose Neutral in the B&W Settings? I have Epson R3000 and just got over air-locks in LC and LLB lines.

DebAnn Loc: Toronto

Pablo8 wrote:

Have you done a 'Nozzle check print-out before or after the Cyan -contaminated 'Advanced B&W' print? Might give some indication to the Cyan fault. Did you choose Neutral in the B&W Settings? I have Epson R3000 and just got over air-locks in LC and LLB lines.

Did nozzle check before as well as after the Cyan issue. Used Advanced B&W and Neutral, as I always do. Problem still exists.

Heather Iles Loc: UK, Somerset

DebAnn wrote:

Did nozzle check before as well as after the Cyan issue. Used Advanced B&W and Neutral, as I always do. Problem still exists.

Perhaps you could contact Epson Consumers Help Line as I find them very helpful. Or there is a printer man on Youtube that seems to know all about printers. I can't think of his name but I am sure that one of the members on this site will point you in the right direction. Or just go on Youtube and type in your problem and you might find the answer or you might even find the printer man that I mentioned. Good luck and please let us know how you got on. I have an Epson P600 in case you are wondering.

DeanS Loc: Capital City area of North Carolina

I have this printer, but never experienced this issue. Has the prob surfaced on other images?

How about the old tried-and-true - x - turn everything off and reboot your puter.

minniev Loc: MIssissippi

I had a similar problem with my r3000 and the outcome was not good. The switching mechanism that is supposed to control the move between MK and PK inks had failed. It was gonna cost more than I paid for the printer to repair it so I replaced it. The problem areas in my prints were a little more towards lime green rather than cyan but the way it posterized certain areas of dark/light and replaced them with the wrong color was very similar.

DebAnn Loc: Toronto

minniev wrote:

I had a similar problem with my r3000 and the outcome was not good. The switching mechanism that is supposed to control the move between MK and PK inks had failed. It was gonna cost more than I paid for the printer to repair it so I replaced it. The problem areas in my prints were a little more towards lime green rather than cyan but the way it posterized certain areas of dark/light and replaced them with the wrong color was very similar.

Today I showed the B&W image to the guys at our best Canadian camera store and they'd never seen an example like this. They think that because the weird colour was cyan, it has to do with its opposite or inverse colour which is magenta. Tonight I printed a colour photo and I got the limish green colour you mentioned. Tomorrow I am going to visit the Epson service centre in Toronto to see what they say. They'll probably offer to do a cleaning at considerable cost. If they don't know, I think I'll do a head cleaning using a mixture of Windex and isopropyl as I've read about. I remember once that I got a professional cleaner who came to my home and did a cleaning that sounds the same. It worked for whatever problem I had at the time. This printer is now several years old so I expect it's reaching the end of its life. I have heard that you can have the printer head replaced but I don't suppose that's very cost effective. This hobby certainly isn't cheap!

rehess Loc: South Bend, Indiana, USA

DebAnn wrote:

Did nozzle check before as well as after the Cyan issue. Used Advanced B&W and Neutral, as I always do. Problem still exists.

Are you storing the photo as a “gray tone” image?

DebAnn Loc: Toronto

rehess wrote:

Are you storing the photo as a “gray tone” image?

Not sure what you mean. It's a black and white image converted using Nik Silver Effects plug-in to Photoshop. This is what I always use and I've done hundreds of B&W images this way and printed them successfully.