best cartridges and 4x6 photo paper for canon pixma ip 5000

[Inez]

Good response that indeed makes the marbles move around. Why is it that these places that you can fill your own cartridges don't know the brand of ink that they carry?

While I am doing my researching here, just so I understand this. The critical inks then are the black 6, yellow 6, magenta 6 and cyan 6 as they are the ones that can plug up the head with the printers unique picolator use in coloured printing???

G & G cartridges worked fine in my old canon 85 and canon 4100 however the manager of the store when I went down to speak to him said he had no idea of the brand of ink that is in the cartridges, simply that I would be using 4 dye based and 1 pigment based.

I obviously have to become better informed as to how to find out what inks are available here even for me to do the filling.
I found one distributor here locally, and left a phone message and sent an email to see if the company knows what ink it sells.

I really appreciate the comments and I will continue googling for local resources here.

BTW, thx also for the comments on the Canon 5200 cartridges. I will pass that info along to a friend who is not going to be thrilled with this news about his new printer and all the talk about chroma colour.

Best regards and again many thankyous.

 

[Osage]

To Inez,

You do touch on some other problems in the pick your vendor game. Many ink vendors are simply middle men--they just buy ink from one source and empty cartridges from another source--and then refill the cartridges--or they just buy the prefilled cartridges in huge bulk--and then vend on the retail level. Usually only the top brass know who their suppliers are and also means that if they change suppliers--the quality is likley to go up or down. So it pays to know who your vendor's supplier is and to be informed if they switch suppliers.

In the case of hobbicolors--they just flat out refuse to disclose who they get ink from. At least they are honest and their ink is good enough to get repeat customers. But hobbicolors other claim to fame is their empty cartridges with a pre-made ink inlet hole with a nylon screw seal. Which makes refilling those very easy. But your Canon Oem cartridges will also make good refill candidiates when they are depleted--what many of us do is simply drill out an ink inlet hole and later seal it with a #6 stainless steel panheaded sheet metal screw with an O-ring on the screw thread. Cheap easy effective. But lots of debate and other ways to get the same job done.--the ink inlet hole created must be sealed air tight or the cartridge leaks.

But the one alarm bell is to never never buy that generic refill kit with ink advertised to work in any brand printer.

And one more thing---the cartridge that will likely be used least is the BCI-6 photoblack.

And for your friend---they are still hard at work trying to defeat the new Canon chips--when and if that happens----he may be a far happier camper. But he can still refill--its just a little harder and more restrictions exist. But many are doing exactly that--refilling the chipped Canons--so send your friend over also. The ip5200 is also a very good printer.

 

[nelda]

My understanding of Inez' hesitancy on refilling has more to do with potentially harming the printer by refilling than an actual inability to do the mechanicals of refilling. I understand that she is a little hesitant to refill if there are economical after market cartridges readily available (G&G in particular). I agree that she may want to consider refilling after she gets over this hesitancy.

I have an iP5000, and I refill with hobbicolors. I am very happy with their kits and the ease in the refilling process. I do admit to having refilled for years, started with a generic refill kit (I now shutter with horror to the damage that I could have done by using generic inks - but the thing was a work horse that worked for years of moderate to heavy use) with the BJC 600 and then the BJC-6000. The old method with drilling holes (or pushing in the refill plug) and using hot glue plugs or little rubber plugs was very economical but could be messy and somewhat challenging from a dexterity point. I managed to get by without any problems, and I am missing most of the fingers on my left hand (old farm accident...long story). Even with her "bungling" ability, I think that she would find hobbicolors kits and cartidges very easy to use. They are simplicty themselves, I just wish the screw had a taper point to it. I do occassionally get ink on my fingers. The mess is worse (for me) with gloves due to the missing fingers.

I have not tried any inks other than hobbicolors with the iP5000, but it was good feedback to hear about the possible problem with the MIS inks. Thanks!

 

[Osage]

To Both Inez and Nelda,

Nelda makes some very good points. But I would somewhat submit the damage the printer risk factor is somewhat reduced by refilling rather than by trying the more numerous inks available in the form of prefilled third party cartridges. Just fewer highly recommended refill inks out there. Nor is it yet established by a single poster on this thread that G&G ink--in the form of the ink or in third party cartridge form is safe in a 1 pico liter printer.--although many poster on many threads do like both MIS inks and G&G for their 2 pico liter printers.--all we have on this thread and that by a N of one is one person saying they had problems with MIS inks in their ip5000. And also a few people weighing in saying they had positive experiences in a ip5000 with both hobbicolors and formulalabs. So having more people who have ip5000's weighing in about their experiences would help this thread--or at it seems to me.

 

[fotofreek]

The Epson suit is about their patented cartridge and not about ink. Neil Slade has made some recent posts indicating that the Canon G&G carts were not good for a short period of time but the latest ones are good. Look for his recent posts and you will see where he buys them. One of the inks you mentioned was correctly named Sensient Formulabs and is available bulk from www.alotofthings.com. The other is Hobbicolors. Their website doesn't have sales info but you can buy it on ebay or email them directly from the link on their web site. I know one owner of an ip5000 in Canada who refills his carts with Hobbicolors. He has also used Formulabs inks before and has been successful with them both. Alotofthings has several aftermarket prefilled carts, including G&G and one called Procolor which they say is filled with Formulabs inks. You can confirm that by contacting them by email or phone. Neil Slade's info on his recent test of several carts can be accessed from one of his most recent threads about the update on his "ink shootout" or you can click on his link at the top of the opening page of this forum. You have already found the potential problem with almost all the vendors. Only a few will tell you what ink is in their prefilled carts. That is why most of us prefer buying bulk inks and refilling. MIS, Formulabs, and Hobbicolors inks have been the favored ones with participants on this forum. Although I've used MIS inks successfully in my i960 for almost two years (six bci-6 carts), the bci-3ebk pigmented ink is the one that can cause problems for the printers that use this cart.

 

[Inez]

Is this b/c this cartridge likely gets the most useage for document printing??, however I thought the 1 pico liter issue was for the ip 5000 an issue that involved the coloured cartridges and clogging of the head because of inferior ink compatability.

The replies certainly help in search of the best ink and resource for it.

Best Regards.

 

[fotofreek]

Pigment-based inks have a suspension of tiny pigment particles as opposed to the dye-based inks being a solution of water, dyes and other ingredients. When Pigment-based inks dry they are less soluble than when dye-based inks dry. That is the reason for the bci-3ebk being of more concern. The person who reported clogs with MIS inks in an ip5000 didn't specify which ink was the problem. I would guess the bci-3ebk. More use actually tends to prevent clogs. The inks mentioned by users on this forum and the comp.periphs.printers newsgroup, MIS, Hobbicolors, and Formulabs, have been successfully used with no more clogs than OEM inks - with the exception of the complaint about the MIS ink in this thread. I am using MIS ink in my wife's ip5000 and just did the first refill on the bci-ebk cart. No problems yet after about two to three weeks of moderately light printing activity.

 

[Tin Ho]

Epson sued G&G for patent infringement. This may apply to G&G's Canon compatible cartridges, especially those spongeless ones. G&G cartridges, both for Epson and Canaon, are still available from retailers not sued by Epson. But this may not last too long.

 

[Inez]

I take it then after reading everything so far that I should insure that i do a print out at least weekly to insure the nozzles don't start to get plugged is that right? (That is if what I am working on does not require computer useage)

Also if I use the cartridges from G & G Save On Cartridges here in Canada, I will never really know what ink is in there. I know that with my older models of Canon's my bjc 85 notebook printer and the bjc 4100 for straight document printing on the Multi Purpose Weyhauser bright 20 lb paper ( i usually always bought this b/c I have a fax machine at home and this brand as up here the paper up here is considered to be of reasonable quality for documents on both my fax and my older model canons; however after doing a plain document print the ink was occasionally wet in some areas when it came out of the printer and in fact if I touched it in the wrong place after it came out I could cause smears. I did not know if it was the paper, the ink or the fact that I was using the Black G & G cartridges. And I was too much of a Noob to even think that there may exist forums on ink jet printers, though I googled and belong to several other Forums to assist in resolution of anything that may cause me issues.

These referenced printers were hand me downs from my sibling. I always keep the ink in supply for my notebook 85 as I do carry that one with me when I go away for a couple of days, however I only use it for documents.
The Save on Cartridges where I get the G & G cartridges from said that I should keep the cartridges in a plastic zip bag in the fridge. The new ones, I should ask if this is good practice. i never want to run out of black ink as i do print more documents than anything else.

Now that I am using my ip 5000 more, how should I insure that the ink does not clog the heads? Do a couple of prints before I take out the cartridge and cover the bottom with the plastic cover and then remove the printhead as well and store it in a plastic zip bag and put it in the fridge as well.
I never really had to do this before as both my 4100 and 85 got regular use. But being that the quality of the prints on the 5000 are so much superior and it has the quiet mode I don't really jump at using the old ones anymore except for my notebook printer when I travel.

I should say that I also used the more expensive Xerox 20 lb multi-purpose paper as well with both of these printers and experienced the same smearing problem with the ink not drying fast enough, most likely b/c of the absorbency factor of the paper or possibly the poor quality of the ink?

I insured with my notebook printer that I used the rubbing alcohol that I bought from Save on Cartridges and would use a Q tip on the areas the tech showed me to keep the inside clean.
I thought that I should post this as it is also an ink issue but also more how to care for these 2 now not so used printers, but I still want to have them available in a pinch.
i would appreciate comments, thankyou.

 

[fotofreek]

I haven't heard of keeping carts in the fridge! Some carts are dated and are supposed to have a two year shelf life. I would expect that room temp storage would be fine. Is the tech concerned about bacterial growth? Stability of the ink? When you travel, how many weeks is your printer unused? A few weeks doesn't seem to be a problem with mine. There is a very good thread on this forum about leaving your computer and printer on and running an automatic print routine to keep the printer functioning while you are gone.

I believe that the Epson suit was specifically about cartridge design patents. I haven't read anything about Canon suing on a similar basis. Anything is possible!