Cleaning an Inkjet Printer Head

The printer I bought the year before last had its printhead sent in for repair once last year, and when I dug it out to use this year, the printhead was dead again…

I tried a bunch of cleaning methods and none of them did squat. You can buy a new printhead, but a quick look on Taobao showed 500 yuan for the black + color set. That’s way too damn expensive.

In the end I was bored and saw someone on Baidu Zhidao recommending “printer printhead cleaning fluid.” It was only 10 yuan, so I figured I’d give it a shot.

The principle is simple: they give you a container, you pour the liquid in, soak the printhead in it, and usually around 24 hours does the trick. I soaked mine for 48.

After pulling it out and wiping it down, it actually worked.

Ten yuan to solve the problem felt like a pretty good deal.