Unclog Brother Inkjet Printhead Nozzles

Clogged nozzles - Brother printers

Brother printers have a built-in, permanent printhead. While this allows Brother to
use a very high quality printhead, anyone who has replaced the printhead after
warranty found out real quick that a new printhead costs more than a new printer!

Whether you use original Brother cartridges or compatible Brother cartridges, there
WILL come a day when a few or even many nozzles will be blocked and the cleaning
cycles will not solve the problem. It is not whether it will happen, but most likely
when.

It is important to understand the problem and why it happens.

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Symptoms:

You just put in a new cartridge and a few nozzles are missing. You run several
cleanings, no improvement, or more times than not, the problem is worse ... even more
nozzles are missing or the whole color is gone! Don't blame the cartridge, it is just a
box of ink and unless the manufacturer has used the wrong ink (which is very unlikely
these days) then you have just been introduced to the number 1 problem for Brother
printer owners.

After 8 or 10 cleans, like a miracle, it starts to print properly ... or you put in another
new cartridge (possibly breaking down and actually buying an expensive, original
Brother cartridge) and low and behold there it is printing perfectly! Unfortunately the
next morning the problem is even worse than it was! How can this be? Now I've got to
run several cleanings every time I want to print and sometimes even this doesn't help.
Now my ink cartridges last half as long. It's just got to be poor quality cartridges?!

And don't forget, 8 or 10 cleanings can use half the ink in the cartridge so you will
definitely get fewer pages from a cartridge if you run many cleanings. Virtually all
compatible cartridges contain at least as much ink as an original; in some cases more.

The above scenario can happen at any time, but it most often happens when changing
a cartridge or if the printer has not been used for an extended period of time. If it
takes you six months or more to go through a set of cartridges, your chances of the
problem described above is several times more likely than those who use their printer
daily.
Why does it Happen?:

Brother printers have become quite dependable on informing you when you must
replace the cartridges. Seldom will a cartridge actually run out of ink before the
printer stops and won't printing again until a new cartridge has been put in. So the
days of running a cartridge dry, and in turn the printhead is pretty much gone.

If you've been using your printer on a regular basis then most often the problem can
arise when you are replacing a cartridge. If you do run a cartridge dry, then air can
get in the nozzles which will block the siphoning action required for the ink to flow
through the printhead.

To overcome this problem when a new cartridge is put in, your Brother printer will
do a priming. As far as I can tell, the logic is, if the printer can suck enough ink
through the printhead, then that should also remove any air in the nozzles. This
usually works. Unfortunately it can sometimes suck out so much ink that the wipers
start to smear the ink all over the printhead which in turn blocks the nozzles. The
more cleanings you do, the more ink that gets smeared on the printheads and the
worse it gets. You have now gone from a problem of air blocking the ink flow on a few
nozzles to smeared ink blocking even more nozzles.

If you manage to get all nozzles printing after 6, 8, 10 or more cleanings your
problems are probably not over. In fact, your problems are probably worse. That half
cartridge of ink sucked out during the cleanings has to go somewhere. Unfortunately
there is nowhere for the ink to go except dry on the printhead. Next day, after the ink
has had plenty of time to dry, you're lucky if you've got any ink on the paper when
you print. How can new ink get through that thick layer of dried ink? Well, it can't!

The only true solution is to remove all that dried ink from the printhead. This is easily
done with most printers. You simply remove the cartridge/printhead assembly and
give the nozzles a quick swipe with a damp paper towel. There goes your dried ink. If
that doesn't solve the problem, you can suck a small amount of ink out of the nozzles
with a priming clip. That gets rid of any air and it only takes a couple seconds.
Another quick swipe and all excess ink is removed. Easy when you can hold the
printhead in your hand.

You probably know already that the Brother printheads are permanent and cannot
be easily removed, therefore cleaning the excess ink off the printhead is not simply a
matter of giving it a swipe with a damp paper towel.

So, before you blame the compatible cartridges for your Brother printer not printing
properly, please realize that it is probably not the fault of the cartridge. It's just a
Brother and that's the nature of the beast!
Prevention:

There are several ways to help prevent clogged nozzles in Brother printheads.

NEVER, NEVER, NEVER RUN MORE THAN 3 CLEANING CYCLES!!!!

The printhead cleaning cycles on models of Brother printers has consistently gotten
longer with each new model introduced to the market. These longer cleaning cycles
suck out more ink in an attempt to clear the clog. Unfortunately, after two or three
cleaning cycles, excess amounts of ink is being smeared over the printhead and can
actually block more or all of the nozzles. The more you clean, the more ink, the more
smearing.

If after two cleanings the nozzles aren't cleared, then print at least 10 full pages. If the
nozzles don't clear themselves within these 10 pages, then further cleanings will not
solve your problem. You will have to manually clean the printheads. See several
methods below.

ALWAYS LEAVE YOUR PRINTER TURNED ON!!

The Brother printers do a "mini-cleaning cycle" a couple times a week, as long as it is

in standby mode (power hasn't been turned off or printer unplugged from the
power). This is to get the ink flowing through the printhead after it has been unused
for a while. If you turn the printer off, then these mini-cleaning cycles to not take
place. Consequently, each cleaning will use ink so your ink levels will go down over
time even if you don't use your Brother printer.

PRINT ON A REGULAR BASIS

You should print several, full color pages AT LEAST ONCE A WEEK! This will help
keep the ink from drying out on the printhead or in the nozzles. Seldom used inkjet
printers (all brands) cause more problems than those which are used on a daily basis.
If it takes you 4, 6 or more months to use a set of cartridges, then an Brother printer is
certainly not the printer for you. Seriously consider a different brand or a laser
printer if you only print black.

USE ONLY THE HIGHEST QUALITY CARTRIDGES!

The few $$$ you save compatible cartridges WILL come back and haunt you.

Methods to manually clean Brother printheads:

We suggest you perform the suggested methods of manually cleaning the Brother
printheads in the order they are listed below. They are listed in order from the easiest
to the more difficult. If the first method does not completely solve the problem, then
go on to the next.

Distilled water or printhead cleaner in sponge

Move printhead assembly to centre of printer:

First, start a cleaning cycle then open up the top of the printer. Not the scanner lid,
but the actual top. You should see the printhead moving back and forth. It is mostly
on the right side but part way through the cleaning cycle you will see it move to the
very left, which puts the printhead over a sponge. The sponge should be white but as it
gets used, it will start to turn black.

The goal here is to loosen and remove the dried ink that is on the printhead. The
easiest way is to saturate the sponge mentioned above and then put the printhead over
it for five or ten minutes. To do that, start a cleaning cycle. When the printhead moves
to the left side, unplug the printer. You will now be able to move the printhead
assembly back and forth freely. With a syringe or eyedropper, put as much Windex
on the sponge as it will hold. Immediately move the printhead to the very left so that it
is over the sponge. Let it sit there for 5 or 10 minutes. This should give the window
cleaner time to soften up any dried ink that is on the printhead. In the meantime, take
a look at the very right side. You will see a little black wiper blade made of soft
rubber. Dampen a small spot on a paper towel with the window cleaner and gently
clean the wiper blade. Repeat until you get no more ink off of it.

Before you plug in the printer, you MUST RETURN THE PRINTHEAD TO THE
VERY RIGHT, over the wiper blade. This is the 'Park' position which is where the
printer expects the printhead to be when the printer is turned on. Plug the printer in
and do a cleaning and print test. (to start a cleaning cycle, you will have to close the
lid) Hopefully you will now be getting some black. If it isn't perfect then I would
repeat this a couple times. If it is close, with only a couple missing nozzles then I would
print a photograph which has lots of the colour which has missing nozzles. If it is the
black, then I would print a black and white photo in the highest resolution.
Clean printhead with paper towels

Fold paper towel and dampen:

Be certain the printer is turned 'off'. Tear a single sheet of paper towel in half. Fold
the sheet in half several times until it is about 1/2 inch by whatever length the sheet
started at. In other words, you want to fold it so it is long and skinny, not square.
Start a cleaning cycle then unplug the printer when the printhead moves to the left,
just like you did in the previous method of cleaning the nozzles. Open the cover of the
Brother printer. Along the path which the printhead assembly travels when printing,
you will see a rubber roller which moves the paper. (this is like the paper roller in a
typewriter). Put the paper towel on top of this rubber roller and use tape on each end
to secure it. Put a few drops of InkMagic printhead cleaner or distilled water near the
middle of the paper towel.

Move printhead assembly over the paper towel and let it rest on top of the damp
portion of the paper towel.

We suggest letting the printhead sit over the paper towel for at least 15 minutes. This
will soften the ink on the printhead. Move printhead assembly back to its resting
position. You will probably notice that the paper towel now has one big black blob of
ink on it. (There is so much excess ink on the printheads that all the colors are mixing
to make black.) If you cannot clearly see individual colors, then dampen another spot
on the paper towel and move the printhead back over the newly dampened spot on the
paper towel. Continue repeating this until you see all the individual colors. You may
have to use several pieces of folded paper towels.

Before turning the printer 'on', be certain to move the printhead back to its resting
position (the extreme right side above the wiper blade) and remove the paper towel
from inside the printer. Now that all excess ink has been removed from the
printheads, your clogged nozzles should be cleared. It may take several pages of dense
print to get the ink flowing properly.

A few nozzles still not printing?

Replace the ink cartridges:

 As a final resort, replace the ink cartridge. There is a good chance that you will have
to call Brother for warranty repair, if the printer is still under warranty. For this
reason we suggest that this time you purchase original Brother cartridges. Never
return an Brother printer for warranty with compatible or refilled cartridges. Doing
so will give Brother the perfect opportunity to blame the problem on the cartridge or
ink. While our experience with Brother printers indicates that it is their built-in
printhead technology which is to blame for most of their problems, you certainly
won't get anyone at Brother to admit it.