Latest on Epson ST440 Ink Monitor

[Whizbang]

The original post was really in the wrong place, but the forum crew must have felt sorry for me and left it alone. <g>  

I discovered through trial and dumb luck that the ST440 printer does not use chip monitoring technology for ink consumption but simply counts the print jobs between refills and possibly adds a volume factor.  

If you refill a cartridge, you must be sure to get the air out of head contact area of cartridge or printer will act as though the printhead is clogged.  Removing the air might prove to be a nearly impossible task.  The last time took several programmed head cleaning tries followed by a 24 hour wait and a lot more cleaning before the head was usable.  I am still trying to figure out how to get all the air out before wasting time on the printer.  I am leaning toward refilling and then sealing and storing the cartridge for a few days.  At a small fortune for a new one, it is worth a shot.  Many refills are out there at a much cheaper price, and I might also go that route.  

If both refills are changed when the one shows that it must be changed, you will get an incorrect reading of ink level in that cartridge when you replace it because the actual ink level is not detected at all.  Ethylene glycol carrier is not easily detected electronically.

The only way I have found to reset the counter after refills are replaced is to
1) hold down the cleaning button on the printer for three seconds until the head moves to the left then
2) pull the power plug during the short moment the head is in reload position (I hope no one from Epson is reading this; I might get sued (he, he)).
3)  Then remove both cartridges, close retaining clamps, plug in the power cord, and restart printer.  Program will not detect the head and assume that both cartridges are empty and reset the counter.
4)  Hold down the cleaning/refill button for three seconds again and the printer will auto-index and stop at refill position.
5)  Insert the refilled cartridges and hope you do not have any air in the head area.  I suppose this would be similar to a vapor lock in a car; the printer simply will not work right.
6)  Recycle printer to print mode and cross your fingers on print trial.

The monitor program was always slow to work, but an updated download from Epson cured the lack of fast response.  Now if someone would just come up with a practical way to remove the air from the cartridges.  I am sure Epson hopes that no one does.