Bands most noticeable at bottom of page on Canon ip8500

[Correzpond]

HpNetServer -

MIS could be the culprit here & as these inks were used in the printer for up to a about a month before I noticed the problem while using Hobbicolors. However my concern really isn't to lay blame on a particular ink; I have read enough about non-OEM inks to suspect that most are more likely to cause clogs than Canon OEM inks.

The '3-pass' just means running the same sheet of paper through a nozzle check 3 times. Basically the ip8500 doesn't lay down enough ink in the separate colour swatches first pass to produce an clearly visable output (at least without scanning & enlarging the output) & repeating the process using the same sheet of paper (although eventually the black ink has trouble absorbing!) exaggerates the output. I recall seeing a post here about this technique by Grandad.

The printer is 11 months old and TPAGE total (printed using the Service Settings, which I recall is a measure of total pages printed) was 2724 yesterday.

 

[Grandad35]

Correzpond,

I post-processed your nozzle check to heighten the colors:

There are some obvious jpeg artifacts and posterization (they look strange, but they are not a problem), but the PM does seem to show a partial blockage at the top and bottom.

I use Formulabs bulk ink, but it isn't known for certain which ink is used in the prefilled carts from Alotofthings - you can't assume that it is the same as their Formulabs bulk ink. Do a search on the forum to see if you can find the posts dealing with this subject.

Switching inks is something that I avoid like the plague. There are just too many possibilities for interactions between incompatible components of the inks. There are many chemical compounds which remain liquid by themselves, but which "precipitate" out as a solid when mixed with the certain other liquid compounds. Each ink supplier has their own formulation, and there is no way to know whether one ink will interact poorly with another. If I had to switch ink suppliers today, I would first purge the print head with alcohol before installing the new ink.

HTH

 

[panos]

Grandad, off topic but why not use ammonia based glass cleaner instead of alcohol ?

 

[Grandad35]

Panos,

There is no reason why some other purging liquid couldn't be used instead of alcohol. I would use alcohol because:
1. I don't mind the smell of rubbing alcohol in the house and I don't particularly like the smell of ammonia.
2. Alcohol has a lower surface tension and should tend to clean out residual ink more easily.
3. Ammonia may well be better at breaking up a clog, but the head doesn't have a clog to clean when simply purging.
4. I already have several bottles of alcohol in the house, and my wife doesn't keep the ammonia based window cleaner in the house. Note that I DO have a bottle of concentrated ammonia in the garage that I use (outside) to clean my car windows of bug residue, but I wouldn't want to bring it into the house because of the smell.

 

[hpnetserver]

Correzpond: thanks for explaining what 3 pass is. Well, some banding may not be as visible as one pass unless the printer can precisely slide through under the print head in each pass. Why not do the nozzle test just one pass using a glossy photo paper? The colors although still very light but banding will be clearer to observe. If your printer is only 11 month old call Canon and get a free new print head under warranty. If you can get a new one from Canon free then you can experiment with cleaning methods and chemicals to see which is more powerful to unclog it. Ip8500 is going to be a very collectable printer when it is discontiuned. Take good care of yours. Good luck.

 

[Correzpond]

Thank you all for your comments, particularly Grandad.

I gave the print-head 2 more cleaning cycles with Rubbing Alcohol. The first saw some improvement, but the second (overnight soak) was also the last as the R & G channels have stopped working completely.

Images are at http://www.pbase.com/correzpond/printer_problems

I realise that this is more likely to be a separate electronic fault caused by the cleaning & demonstrates why cleaning should only be used circumspectly. So for now it's definitely back to Canon.

P.S. Are there instructions available for posting images within-page on this site as Grandad has done above? This seems somewhat slicker than using my off-site image posts.

 

[Grandad35]

P.S. Are there instructions available for posting images within-

page on this site as Grandad has done above? This seems somewhat slicker than using my off-site image posts.

See:
http://www.nifty-stuff.com/forum/viewtopic.php?id=36


BTW, here is a post processed version your image after 1 cleaning. The PM is very light, but there seems to be color across the entire print head. There is a lot of posterization because the contrast was magnified to such a high degree.

 

[Correzpond]

I agree that the Nozzle check was looking reasonably good at this point. However as my test print (the sunset at http://www.pbase.com/correzpond/printer_problems) continued to show definite (albeit improved) striping at the 1.5cm point I decided to proceed with the ultimately fatal overnight clean.

Perhaps I should have been happy to settle, but as the printer is under warranty I took the position that if the print quality wasn't perfect then I would in any case pursue replacement of the print head.

 

[d86cfv]

My MP760 is doing exactly the same thing (see my other post) its just on the end of the paper. I had a canon engineer spend hours with my machine and all he could come up with was that it is an inherant problem with canon printers! Not being happy i insisted they replaced the machine.

They did so under warranty and i was disgusted to see that the fault remains. Here's what its doing:

I'll try the post it note option, the canon guy said as the paper was hanging down as it came out of the printer it lifted up the end in there which means the ink doesnt spray on the paper propperly. I've had 2 print heads and it does it on both, it also does it regardless of what ink, OCP or Canon.

Either way, this is unaceptable!

Regs,

Dan

 

[panos]

d86cfv, could you post the original photo? I'd like to give it a try