Epson 3800 magenta ink clog ...and other weirdness

Nothing like reviving an old thread... I recently acquired a 2nd hand 3800 and it also suffers from magenta nozzle clogging. Y, LC, and PK are slightly clogged but nothing to really stress about. I'm running an all black set. I tried everything except running a cleaning cartridge or doing a nozzle flush by removing the dampers... which I absolutely will not attempt! Printing a digital negative under these conditions results in very gritty mess.
So, with QTR I set it up so that only 5 inks print (3PK, LK, LLK), printed out a negative and it looks pretty good. I'll work this way hoping until Y, LC, and PK nozzles print normally and exclude M entirely... unless it decides to rear it's ugly head!
I sure miss my 4000!

My epson 3800 pro weirdness problem:
The photo black PK is not printing. The nozzle check test do not show photo black and my prints do not print photo black.
Yes, I've cleaned the heads and run power cleaning, no luck. Everything else works great and this printer made great prints for 10 years.
epson says it's a hardware problem. Anybody familiar with this problem?
Ave Pildas

Try the matte ink side. IF it prints, then you have the famous ink switch over problem. The ink switch is clogged and the PK ink probably just emptied itself into your waste ink cartridge. To solve the problem, you will need to replace the ink switch, or replace all of the dampers and switch as a set. Either way, not a simple process. Mine did this and I just continued printing matte prints out of mine, ignoring the glossy side. Simplest solution if you have lots of inks left, find a used 3800/3880. All the inks will work in the 3880, EXCEPT the magenta and light magenta. You will need the VIVID magenta ink set in the 3880. Sorry.