Canon MG5250 printing black as blue when using photo paper

[PeterBJ]

Google translations are often less than perfect but this translation from the electroda link posted by Łukasz looks like the problem posted by PhilandJojones:

Hello, I have a problem with my Epson 3880 printer, I use it for half a year, and until yesterday everything was perfect. Today started printing everything on chbrowy deep black-blue color. Ink cartridges are original and each is still about 50-60% of capacity....

So I think Łukasz is right in suspecting a problem with the dye black.

So could you upload a nozzle check before trying fancy tricks to improve B/W printing?

 

[Łukasz]

Google makes life easier

Short story:
- EPSON Stylus Pro 3880, non-refilled OEM cartridges 50-60% full, everything fine
- next day deep-black parts of printout become intensely blue
- changing printer options and profiles doesn't help
- printing nozzle check revealed lack of one black ink
- deep cleaning solved problem

It is surprising to me, why is it blue instead of dark gray?
Maybe it is right, that it has something to do with continuity of visible spectrum.

Ł.

P.S.
Word "chbrowy" is incorrect, it should be "chabrowy" - Cornflower-like (cornflower blue). Word is from other language.

 

[turbguy]

The printer driver may mix colors during grey-scale printing, even with a photo black...

 

[palombian]

Indeed.
When you download and enlarge you can see the color dots on this scan of a roentgen photo (courtesy of wikipedia), printed with the MG5250 on glossy paper (using Peach cartridges).
Even on plain paper these printers

mix colors to make grey.
This is the first place where you can see problems with a color.
Continue printing in the hope the missing color will be forced back is not a good idea, but from own experience a Canon printhead does not burn by printing a few pages dry.

 

[Łukasz]

(...) printed with the MG5250 on glossy paper (using Peach cartridges). Even on plain paper these printers mix colors to make grey.

CLI-BK is intended to cover very dark areas rather than midtones. It is sole 5 pl, rather than 5 pl, 2 pl, 1 pl mix used by CLI-C, CLI-M or (dedicated) CLI-GY.

Continue printing in the hope the missing color will be forced back is not a good idea, but from own experience a Canon printhead does not burn by printing a few pages dry.

Distorted nozzles phenomena on CLI-BK (or CLI-Y) is because of printing few pages dry.

Ł.

 

[The Hat]

When you choose to print a B&W photo on Glossy Paper then your printer will always use as many colours as possible in the mix, and if you choose to print the same photo this time setting your printer to Greyscale the results will be exactly the same. (Try it)

On the other hand if you print the B&W photo on Plain Paper, now this is there you’ll see a significant difference between the two prints, one will have the colour mixed into the print as before.

But when you choose the greyscale setting this time the printer will disable all of the cartridges in favour of just one, the single Matte black cartridge !

Here’s the big BUT, this all goes out the window if the printer that’s used does not have a dedicated Matte black cartridge, it’s exactly the same on both dye and pigment printers !

 

[PeterBJ]

By coincidence I have just finished some experiments similar to those suggested by The Hat using an iP3600 with the pigment black cartridge flushed and refilled with dye black.

Here is a downloaded X-ray photo printed first using all dye cartridges but in greyscale mode. The same photo looks exactly the same printed in normal colour mode, note the greyscale is not perfect:

and an enlarged crop showing different colours are used printing greyscale. The photo black seems only to be used in the very dark areas:

Here the same photo is printed on the same photo paper as the first image. The pigment black ink has been replaced with dye ink and plain paper is selected. Now only the dye black from the large cartridge is used, and greyscale is much better. But this comes at a price, the resolution for the pigment black nozzles is lower than for the dye nozzles, so the image has become grainy. To avoid getting too dark a picture, I had to reduce intensity by 20 units in the printer settings:

And a crop enlarged the same amount as the crop of the dye printout:

The much better greyscale suggests that mikling's greyscale ink set could work perfectly for B/W prints. I intend to try the idea by Łukasz of replacing a magenta cartridge with a photo black cartridge, of course with a magenta chip attached. I think this method has great potential for nice B/W prints.

To me the "implant" looks like a Sel-Call unit from a commercial VHF radio, maybe brand Storno.

 

[Łukasz]

Some time ago there was a controversy about plain paper B/W printing on x25/x26 ink type printers (eg. MG5150, MG5250, iP4850 and so).

Some tests have been performed with three settings:

1. High quality plain paper settings for simplex, detailed settings are:
   • unchecked "Duplex Printing"
   • unchecked "Borderless Printing"
   • unchecked "Grayscale Printing"
   • "Media Type" -> "Plain Paper"
   • "Printing Quality" -> "High"
2. Like 1, but:
   • checked "Grayscale Printing"
   
   
3. Like 2, but:
   • checked "Grayscale Printing"
   • checked "Duplex Printing"

Testing printer was MG5150 with cheap ready made 3-rd party inks (dye-based PGBK).

Results are from 1 to 3 in columns:

Closeup in lights (fields 5%, 10% and 15%), from 1 to 3 in rows:

1. 
2. 
   
   
3. 

Closeup in 3/4 tones (fields around 65%), from 1 to 3 in rows:

1. 
2. 
3. 

Some conclusions are:
- set 2 is pure PGBK print, even in high quality mode
- duplex printing never uses PGBK, relies on CLI-BK instead
- duplex B/W printing isn't sole CLI-BK, while simplex B/W printing is sole PGBK
- duplex printing isn't engaging finest droplets in lights even in high quality mode
- PGBK or CLI-BK is slightly engaged in 3/4 tones
- CLI-Y droplets are so huge compared to its CLI-C and CLI-M 1 pl peers

Ł.

 

[martin0reg]

Reason for duplex = CLI-BK is potential smearing of the backside because of slower drying of PGBK.

Beside this I remember that if you print a color image on plain paper, PGBK is used for black areas of a certain density ... from ??% to 100% black areas = PGBK, below ??% black areas = mixed colors
(sorry but I am struggling with "technical english" here..)

PS: anyway using canon pgi for printing "black only" is suboptimal, not only because of lower resolution but in practice because of stripes, which I could never avoid. With epson 6 channel printes (p50 1400 ...) "black only" is more useful.

 

[Łukasz]

Beside this I remember that if you print a color image on plain paper, PGBK is used for black areas of a certain density ... from ??% to 100% black areas = PGBK, below ??% black areas = mixed colors

That's right.
Such situation is 1. setting from previous post. The moment of switching from CMY composition to PGBK is depending on quality settings - lq: ~40%, mq: ~50% and hq: ~60%.
PGBK tone reproduction curve isn't linear, it is "sinusoidal" (very smooth). CMY compilation curve probably slightly drops in dark shadows, but solid black is reinforced mainly with Cyan (and it is full of PGBK).

CMY composition in lights (settings recalled by martin0reg):

Again the same settings, but printed on glossy photo paper (that makes dye-based PGBK is able to reproduce similar sized dots like in normal pigment-to-plain-paper situation).
Presence of 30 pl PGBK droplets is visible starting from ~65%.

(here is a scanner artifact very hard to spot - one line at ~60% is thinner than expected to be )

PS: anyway using canon pgi for printing "black only" is suboptimal, not only because of lower resolution but in practice because of stripes, which I could never avoid. With epson 6 channel printes (p50 1400 ...) "black only" is more useful.

Getting rid of these strips is a difficult thing. After some intensive experiments, it looks like their nature have something to do with resonance of printer body while bi-directional printing
Epson has also variable dots size...

Ł.