DesignJet 500 24" Printhead Errors; Won't Print Yellow or Black. Carriage Cover Broken.

[SingingSun]

I am troubleshooting an HP DesignJet500 24" that won't print yellow (cartridge is low though), cyan is faded, black will print some parts of the printhead alignment page but not others, and blue seems fine but has a few lines in it. This printer has been sitting a while though, and needs fresh carts and printheads. 

This machine came with a carriage cover that is broken; the upper right hand side has a peg that goes into a hole and that peg part broke off. It seems sometimes when I try to close it that some sort of spring-loaded tension is (or should be) there. The printhead menu gives errors for all three right hand side printheads, but not for the one on the far left, the one that is getting pressed by the carriage cover.

What I need to know is, do I need to replace the carriage cover in order for the machine to be operable? I am already ordering the heads and carts tomorrow, just wondering if I absolutely need to also have this part for the printer to function. 

Thank you!

[davidzuts · Accepted solution]

You need the cover or you will not have constant operation. See link below where you can get from China.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/C7769-69376-Print-Head-Assembly-Carriage-Cover-HP-DesignJet-500-500ps-510-80...

You will want to check the tube assembly for air before using new printheads. Use a syringe to draw ink to make sure all air is gone in the tube assembly.

[SingingSun]

Thanks a ton for this... I have been lurking and benefited a TON from your posts already, you are a godsend.

I am going to follow through and follow up. Right now, what happened is, I knew I needed to purge air from  the tubes, but I assumed that I needed to take parts off and get to the main tubing to do that. I already had recently figured out how to get to the service mode, saw the 'purge' ink tubes option and thought what the heck. Well, since this baby has been sitting, the yellow is pretty low. So if readers out there do their research, if you try to purge lines with low ink, even if you try to rectify the problem, you cannot, if any of your inks are low.

Luckily for me, not that huge of a problem since I already have new printheads and new inks on order. In the meantime, I noticed that the ink cartridges say they expired in 2008. I am amazed (and honestly, impressed), that ink is still even flowing after this amount of time. 

Needless to say, as a print customer that has print customers myself and have recently switched from Canon, I think I'm in love. Even with the issues.  What machine can sit that long and still be even (mostly) functional? But I digress. Especially since I have not gotten my first full print from it quite yet. I did get this machine at a great deal, but expected much more problems. I have been using an HP Officejet for about six months in the meantime and was very impressed as well, as compared to Canon.

Anyway, the printer is stuck in the 'loop' of the 'purge' tubes thing until I get my yellow next sat., new printheads and carts are on order as of earlier today. I did have a syringe (18 gauge, 5ml, needle point, for those that are looking), and I went ahead and cleared the lines. I noticed that it was quite a bit harder to push the needle into the black and yellow ports, so maybe that was part of the problem. Have locked the carriage and am waiting for the supplies to arrive to update. Will let you know how it goes and once again, thanks for the help!

[davidzuts]

You now have an issue where the plotter is looking for what are called setup heads. Without them the purge message will not go away. That is why I said to use a syringe since you do not need the setup heads. Since you still have the old heads what you can do is trick the plotter. It is looking for setup heads that do not have any contacts on the back. You need to place some tape over the contacts on the back of each printhead and then insert them in the carriage assembly when it asks for the setup heads. The plotter will then perform the purge which will not really take place since there is no resovior for the ink to go into which the setup heads have. This will at least get rid of the message. Do not use the purge menu item unless you have setup heads as the procedure can not be canceled once started.

[SingingSun]

I did try tape over the old heads previously, it was clear desk tape and I only covered the top square contact on the backs, just got an 86.01 paper jam error. I found another of your posts where you recommended this method to someone else and gathered that I needed to cover the entire back of the contact strip. I tried using painters tape and still got an 86.01 paper jam error. I'm in the process of trying electrical tape right now, but am still worried a bit since I found another help post on another site where the guy ordered the setup heads and all, but still couldn't clear the 86.01 error when you try to close the window and continue with the purge process. 

I've already completely cleaned the service station, cleaned the strip, oiled the bar and the belt looks good. The machine originally had a 21.10 error due to the service station and got that all fixed. Just REALLY wish I hadn't selected prime tubes right now, haha.

[SingingSun]

Well I cleared the prime tubes loop, just not in a way I expected.

I did cover the back of the printheads with electrical tape (this made them hard to get out, rocking them towards me a bit helped), got the same paper jam error. I then took the printheads out again, cleaned the backs of them and the inner printer contacts, then replaced the printheads. I then sat down to order the setup printheads. I must have forgotten to turn off the printer after that, as I walked by it a bit later to see the display showing the regular main menu again! I have no idea how it happened, and wish I'd been paying more attention to exactly the steps I took. 

Luckily the seller who I ordered the setup printheads from allowed me to cancel, something I hate to do but will most likely be buying something from them again in this venture, heheh.

Tried to print again just in case, and only blue is printing now, but new printheads and carts are due to arrive tomorrow, will update how it goes. Will be syringe purging again before install.

[SingingSun]

Just to update-- the inks came yesterday but was missing the cyan printhead. Thankfully, the supplier contacted me within 24h and agreed to send me the cyan. I am a small time seller myself so I do understand these types of problems and do have a good bit of patience, within reason. The seller sent via priority mail unexpectedly which was a major bonus. Just need that cyan. Am waiting now, I assume they will be sending via regular USPS post so I may not be updating for several days, fyi to anyone who may be following.

Edit to add: I am mostly a graphic designer on an extremely tight budget, but knew what I was getting into when I started this venture. I have established clients and I am positive I can profit from large format, if I can only get a machine going. My initial investment in the machine was $50 locally, it had been professionally serviced its entire life and was used moderately gently at a big business, which was more than I expected. I expected a paperweight, lol. The entire thing was in pretty good shape overall, and if this works out I have a chance to get another and a 42" 800 which I will probably invest in if it all works out. My total investment so far has been less than $120, so this is still, despite delays and repairs needed, a fantastic deal. I am assuming, at this point, that I may need to replace the tube assembly after all of this, which will run me between $50-$100 additional. After that, I'll have to consider parting or selling etc. as I could get one of these locally that is operational for around $600-1k.

[SingingSun]

Update to say-- SHE WORKS MARVELOUSLY! Huge thanks to this forum and especially the many posts on this model from davidzutz! I now have a working machine for less than $120 total investment 🙂

Cyan arrived in two days, seller was fantastic about replacing the missing head (discountinkllc) but I got sick and put it all off for a few days. Purged tubes with syringe before install. I almost messed up bigly though when installing the new printheads-- I had no idea that there was a 'cap' that goes over the metal needle inside the circular piece at the bottom of them when they are new, almost just jammed them in there and was confused for a minute!

The alignment and first few test prints had a bit of a black pooling/smudging issue but that could have been due to the paper I was using at the time (cardstock) as regular printing papers looked fine-- I did eventually get another brand of cardstock to work, below is a 11x14" test on normal resolution.

Still waiting on the carriage cover to come before running it too much, but casually working on calibration and getting the prints out right. I'd assumed it would print borderless or with smaller margins so trying to figure that out since I sell a good amount of 11x14" prints but the margins are pretty large. Whole other topic though, and am SUPER EXCITED about being able to offer poster prints now!

Great machine so far and compliments my trusty officejet 7612 ! The initial 21:10 error was resolved by fully cleaning the service station (with guidance from forum posts here). It was a pretty easy fix, hardest part was figuring out how to disassemble the main body of the service station, turns out there's two tabs on each side to depress. The youtube vids I watched on it seemed to skip that part.

Thanks again, very happy with this project!

designjet 500