Chip bought me this printer many years ago for Christmas. I believe it was in 2006 and I was coming home from visiting my aunts in Texas and he surprised me with it when I came home from the airport. But I could be wrong about the year and when he surprised me with it. I do remember that I was coming home from visiting someone and this was my Christmas present, but I digress.

I believe in Kodak. I believe they make a quality product and they don’t sell crap that you only own for a few years and have to buy a new one. I’ve had this printer for a lot longer than I had my HP, Dell and… Oh I can’t seem to remember the name of my very first printer. Every printer I’ve ever owned before this one has let me down. This printer has worked every single time no matter what.

The issue I am having has happened a couple times before and the solution was the same both times. My printer shoots blank sheets out and I do the deep clean and all that does is drain my ink cartridges and then I have to buy more just to have those drain the same way. Both times Kodak sent me a new printer head along with brand new ink cartridges to replace the ones I lost from the deep cleaning.

I’ve often wondered what happens to all the ink or where it goes and this answered my question.

This is bad, and for some of reason the sponge material that is under the cartridge touches the paper as you can see here.

I wasn’t exactly sure how I could handle this issue. I got ink on my fingers when I removed the paper and was able to wash it off with just water and a wash cloth, so I figured that if it came off my finger so easily, it might come out of that spongey material. I wet some paper towels and let the ink soak into the paper towel, which it did. I had to use another one and then a dry one and it seems to have worked to clean the ink that was drained from my brand new black ink cartridge that by the way I just bought this week at Target. My color cartridge was also full and now they are both empty.

Since a new printer head was the solution before, I figured since I’ve had it for so many years that I would just buy it from Amazon and not ask for a free one it from Kodak. Then again I don’t know if they would give me a free one, they might sell it to me for $50 for all I know. The one I bought on Amazon was only $16 with free shipping if my order was $35 or more. I bought some Kodak compatible ink to replace the ones that I drained from the deep cleaning. They were only $22 and I’m getting 2 XL color and 3 XL black cartridges. My total was $40.

When I was at target buying ink this week, I also bought a new bicycle pump and 2 new tubes. I wanted to buy rechargeable bike lights for $30, but I figured I wouldn’t have enough money for the rest of the month, and now I’m glad I didn’t buy them. The most important thing to me right now is to be able to print receipts and shipping labels for my Etsy shop which is in vacation mode until my printer works again.

It seems that everything is happening to me this month. I’m just waiting for a giant safe or grand piano to fall on my head lol. Let’s just hope the rest of the month doesn’t continue on this path, but just in case it does, I’m laying low.