caring for printheads maintaining the printheads The printheads for your printer have microscopic nozzles that can clog when exposed to the air for more than a few minutes. The printer is designed to prevent nozzles from drying out when the printer is idle and when it is turned off using the POWER button on the printer. A printhead that is not used for long periods of time can also clog, resulting in a noticeable decrease in print quality. To unclog the nozzles, clean the printheads. maintenance tasks using the LCD control panel cleaning the printheads Clean the printheads when lines or dots are missing from printed text or graphics.
These defects occur when ink nozzles in the printheads are exposed to air for a prolonged period of time. You need to perform basic maintenance tasks to improve print quality and the health of the affected printer parts. To clean the printheads: Press (select button) on the LCD control panel. Press (down arrow button) to highlight CONFIGURE DEVICE, and then press (select button) to select CONFIGURE DEVICE. Press (down arrow button) to highlight PRINT QUALITY, and then press (select button) to select PRINT QUALITY. Press (down arrow button) to highlight CLEAN PRINTHEADS, and then press (select button) to select CLEAN PRINTHEADS.
aligning the printheads The printheads are automatically aligned upon installation. Misaligned printheads produce ragged edges, stray dots, white lines, or banding on printouts. If your printouts look like the printheads are misaligned, you can align them through the LCD control panel. To align the printheads: Press (select button) on the LCD control panel. Press (down arrow button) to highlight CONFIGURE DEVICE, and then press (select button) to select CONFIGURE DEVICE. Press (down arrow button) to highlight PRINT QUALITY, and then press (select button) to select PRINT QUALITY.
Press (down arrow button) to highlight ALIGN PRINTHEADS, and then press (select button) to select ALIGN PRINTHEADS. The printer prints a page with alignment patterns in 5 minutes. use and maintain hp restricted 3-43 message description CLEAN PRINTHEADS Initiates the printhead cleaning process. ALIGN PRINTHEADS Initiates the alignment process.