# kodak hero 5.1



## totallyflumoxed (Jul 18, 2012)

Hi.
I recently printed loads of text and black ink ran out. Switched font colour to blue and completed task. 
Purchased new black cartridge and also a colour/black cartridge combination.
fitted new black cartridge and printed some more text in black. Then low colour warning came on so I changed colour cartridge, ready for next task.
My daughter printed some text this morning and black was very faint; also yellow was missing. 
I ran head-cleaning several times, and then ran printer calibration several times. what a waste of ink!!
Hero this is NOT!!!

STILL no black and no yellow.
Can I clean head manually or is this a 'return to vendor' situation? Can anybody help?


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## pip22 (Aug 22, 2004)

Really bad printhead blockages will often be too much for the cleaning process built in to the driver software.

Manual cleaning is possible, though whether it will fix the problem remains to be seen.
Take out the cartridges and look inside the slots where they fit on the printhead (a torch is useful here). You should see a small hole at the bottom of each slot. Put a few drops of alcohol-based solvent into each hole and leave to soak overnight. Or buy a bottle of this and use as per maker's instructions: Ink Cartridge Cleaning Fluid - Printhead Cleaner

Next day, put the cartridges back and try printing something in black & colour several times until (hopefully) the inks come through.


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## totallyflumoxed (Jul 18, 2012)

thanx pip22, will try a few drops of vodka. at least if it doesn't work it won't feel a thing when i pitch it thru' the window.


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## totallyflumoxed (Jul 18, 2012)

i suppose i should get down to staples and buy some proprietary cleaner if it's open tomorrow.
what annoys me is that i get a low colour warning and then it dries up without further printing.


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