# Black Specs On Mug After Pressing



## mydirtylaundry (Jul 3, 2006)

Anyone ever had this problem before, black specs on there mugs after pressing them. Its driving my crazy, the mugs are clean, there is nothing but the image on the paper, were am I going wrong.

Thanks in advance.


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## JuanManuel (May 23, 2012)

Maybe you are talking about lines by the border of the paper,
I use to cut the border of the paper, because sometimes they have ink and you don't see until pressed


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## mydirtylaundry (Jul 3, 2006)

Thanks for the reply. No, they are not lines left from the template, but rather back specs of some sort, maybe in the coating of the mugs?


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## DKgrafix (Aug 13, 2008)

Picture tells a thousand words


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## jpkevin (Oct 22, 2007)

Some of the older small Epson printers such as the Epson C88 would spatter ink when they printed. You could not see it on the paper because the specks were so small. But with sublimation, the dots got bigger due to dot gain, (the dyes turn to gas when heated so they get a bit bigger) so when they were sublimated they were visible. Those small printers had really cheap heads.


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## mgparrish (Jul 9, 2005)

jpkevin said:


> Some of the older small Epson printers such as the Epson C88 would spatter ink when they printed. You could not see it on the paper because the specks were so small. But with sublimation, the dots got bigger due to dot gain, (the dyes turn to gas when heated so they get a bit bigger) so when they were sublimated they were visible. Those small printers had really cheap heads.


Newer Epson desktops do this too. The older ones are worse if you don't keep the printer covered when not in use, newer Epson close up better.

I've had issues over the years with this, cleaning the capping station and under the printhead resolves this.


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## mgparrish (Jul 9, 2005)

mydirtylaundry said:


> Anyone ever had this problem before, black specs on there mugs after pressing them. Its driving my crazy, the mugs are clean, there is nothing but the image on the paper, were am I going wrong.
> 
> Thanks in advance.


This is very likely due to what Kevin @ JP mentions. The spattering is caused usually by "gunk" underneath the print head. The ink "stream" gets diverted much like what happens when you put your thumb over a running water hose.

The solution is to clean the capping station and under the printhead as shown in this video.

How to maintain small format Epson printers

The procedure in the video it will work the same way on the C88. You can skip the part where the video shows injecting cleaning fluid into the head. Just clean the capping station, wiper, and underneath the print head while the carriage is not sitting in the "park" position.


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## GordonM (May 21, 2012)

If you can't see the little black specks after printing, try pressing a clean (unused) transfer sheet, just to rule out there's nothing funky with your paper. However, I agree with the others that it's quite likely a splatter issue. Depending on the magnitude of the problem these can be hard to detect without good reading glasses or a magnifying glass. Keep either/both handy when you print.


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## binki (Jul 16, 2006)

Clean the mugs with alcohol and see if that clears it up


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## mydirtylaundry (Jul 3, 2006)

Wow, thanks for the responses. This all makes perfect sense. I guess I never really thought the printer was the problem because it is new and doesn't have a lot of prints on it yet. 

It also doesn't happen all the time, but it is more noticeable when the print I am doing is large. Thanks again for all the invaluable info.


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## FLPrint (Feb 10, 2011)

Did you ever get your answer as to specs of ink on your mugs after pressing? The answer is the ink is gassing out from underneath the transfer paper. I am having this new problem after pressing mugs for months and never seeing this. What has changed is I am using a new inexpensive mug press that is part of a multi purpose heat press bundle. I would like to get this to work as it would allow me to do certain shapes that I cannot presently do. I'm curious what your solutions was.


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