Printer doesn't print in right colour?

[Salsa123]

I have owned this printer for three years but never used it. I just installed it on my new PC and did a few diagnostic runs like cleaning cartridges and printer etc. All was fine and the test print worked. Yet when I print a document it comes out with a blue hue despite it being just a black text document. BTW printer settings are in grayscale so what else is possible?

 

[hang-the-9]

Replace the ink, 3 years of the ink sitting there will dry up the nozzles and ink, especially if the ink was already installed.

Try setting the printer to normal color and see how it looks like.

 

[Salsa123]

Replace the ink, 3 years of the ink sitting there will dry up the nozzles and ink, especially if the ink was already installed.

Try setting the printer to normal color and see how it looks like.

I'll give it a shot i just ordered some hp 301 tricolour and black. Also I installed the cartridges myself and other forums have told me to the clean the printer heads manually, is that a viable option?

 

[hang-the-9]

Cleaning the heads is fine, not very hard. Was this a new older printer you just setup or was it already used and put away for 3 years with the ink inside it?

 

[Salsa123]

Cleaning the heads is fine, not very hard. Was this a new older printer you just setup or was it already used and put away for 3 years with the ink inside it?

It was a new printer and I just re-installed it after 3 years also I had put the ink cartridges myself back then too (I also occasionally printed and it came out fine)

 

[hang-the-9]

It "was" a new printer, all of them "were" new LOL. If you "re-installed it" means it was installed at some point.
I mean was it new out of the box NOW with new cartridges or did you use it 3 years ago, then stick it away somewhere for 3 years with cartridges already installed? Or even with the cartridges not installed but 3 years old and used before.

 

[Salsa123]

It "was" a new printer, all of them "were" new LOL. If you "re-installed it" means it was installed at some point.
I mean was it new out of the box NOW with new cartridges or did you use it 3 years ago, then stick it away somewhere for 3 years with cartridges already installed? Or even with the cartridges not installed but 3 years old and used before.

My bad it was used 3 years ago then stuck away somewhere with cartridges installed.

 

[hang-the-9]

It "was" a new printer, all of them "were" new LOL. If you "re-installed it" means it was installed at some point.
I mean was it new out of the box NOW with new cartridges or did you use it 3 years ago, then stick it away somewhere for 3 years with cartridges already installed? Or even with the cartridges not installed but 3 years old and used before.

My bad it was used 3 years ago then stuck away somewhere with cartridges installed.

Yep, that is pretty much guaranteed to be dried ink and/or print heads. Inkjets have two ways they print black, by combining all the colors or using only the black tank. If you did a test and black looks blue, it likely means that one of the color cartridges is not working 100% and causing the blue tinge since you need an equal amount of the colors to make black. The other issue may be the black ink is old or print head messed up enough to change what it looks like when printed. Try to do a few prints with different options, black only, greyscale, color photo, etc.. after going though those you may be able to narrow down when the issue shows up, and from there figure out which ink is bad.