I have a Brother MFC-6490CW that my husband purchased for me somewhere between one and two years ago. I just recently decided to use it, and the black ink would not print. I thought the original cartridge that came with the printer may have dried out. I purchased a new cartridge and installed it, and still no black prints even after "cleaning" several times. What should I try next?

Power purge the machine:

Hold down the menu key. While still holding the menu key, unplug the machine and plug it back in. Do not let go of the key until the machine reboots and the screen says "maintenence". Hit the following keys: 7, 6, 4,black start. The machine will then go into "power purge" or deep clean mode for about 5-7 minutes. When complete hit: 99 to get out of maintanence and reboot. Be sure to have extra ink cartidges on hand as it does use up a lot of ink but this process works the best every time when the printer wont print

I had the same problem. Black would not print correctly.The test print page would leave the black patterns with a lot of gaps.

I performed several cleaning cycles and things got from bad to worse until finally the black pattern was completely empty.Few more cleaning cycles did not do the trick.I then learned that once the nozzle is clogged, each cleaning cycle actually makes things WORSE by adding ink to the clogged nozzle that, once dried, makes the clogging denser.So I tried an experiment.
I filled a used non original black cartridge with WINDEX (window cleaner) 1/4 full.
I run some cleaning cycles and, Lo and Behold, after the 2nd cleaning the Black pattern was 99% full on the test page!


I then printed some mixed text and pictures WITH THE WINDEX cartridge and it prints fine, with the possible exception that the black appears a little faded......
Which means that the windex is diluting the dried ink that clogged the nozzle and using that to print.


I plan to continue using the windex cartridge until the black on the paper is too faded, before replacing it with a real black cartridge.


I don't know if the windex is spoiling the machine (use at your own risk) but I was desperate to the point of considering buying another printer altogether.


Hope it helps

Chris what you do not realize is that this printer is a $600 to $700 WIDE FORMAT inkjet.
Yes $150 for print heads usually means replacing an inket, but not in the case of this wide format model.

If an inkjet printer has not been used for some time and several print head deep cleaning has been done and it still does not print properly then the nozzles in the print head are blocked.
Inkjet printers need to be used frequently to prevent nozzles blocking with dried ink.
You need to replace the print head to get the printer functioning again.
But these print heads are expensive to replace, it may be better to buy a better and a later model printer for not much more costs.