Wait, you need to remove the plugs when printing? I didn't see any kind of hole like that on the stock cartridges. I thought the plugs were for filling the cartridges only. And I appreciate the words of encouragement. Unfortunately it looks like I bricked my printer trying to clean it as the motherboard rests directly beneath the print assembly, and the fluid WILL leak if the ink pump doesn't immediately suck it up with a cleaning cycle. I'm definitely trying to stay positive, it's just such a frustrating market right now. I can't even buy a used P400 even if I wanted to, and then the print head would literally cost more than 2X brand new XP-15000 if it ever needed to be replaced. And the printer I REALLY wanted was something in the R1800/1430 range, which are now selling for double/triple since being discontinued, and I'm starting to suspect that the head price is also going to get jacked up in the near future. I still have my trusty R280, but I NEED something that can do A3. As infuriating as it is to deal with this printer (XP-15000), I feel like learning the quirks now is probably a better option than desperately trying to cling to 20 year old printer scavenging rapidly diminishing parts. And as awful as it is to feel like I'm bricking these printers consecutively, for $300 they are basically disposable anyway. My background is in CNC, so I am much more used to knowing all of the fundamentals of how machine works than with these inkjet machines. I know the R280 like the back of my hand and that definitely made me a little overconfident when hacking the XP-15000. I have another one on the way so hopefully I manage to not brick this next one.