Canon ip6000d printing is very light

[ghwellsjr]

There are basically two approaches to cleaning a print head outside of the printer. One is to flow a cleaning solution over or through the print head and the other is to soak the nozzles in a shallow pool of cleaning solution. In my previous post, I described an example of the first approach but here is a safe method to perform both approaches without removing the print head from the printer:

Open the printer cover and wait for the print head to come to a stop in the center.
Remove the cartridges for the colors you want to clean.
Put a drop or two of Windex on the screen inlets in side the print head.
Replace the cartridges.
Put some Windex on the purge pad off to the right where the print head parks.
Make sure the Windex does not drain away.
Close the printer cover.
Unplug the printer without turning the printer off or doing anything else to it.
Let the printer sit for a day or overnight.
Plug the printer in and do a nozzle check.
Repeat many times.

Note: the iP6000D is different from most other Canon printers. If you open the cover after you have been printing and put Windex on the purge pad, it will remain there. If you close the cover, wait for activity to stop, and open the cover, the Windex should be sucked away. If you then put more Windex on the purge pad, it will immediately be drained away. This is unusual. For every other Canon printer that I have done this to, the Windex will not be drained away. So for your iP6000D, it is very important when doing this cleaning technique that you make sure the Windex is not drained away. If it is, do a nozzle check and then start the process making sure that you only open and close the cover one time.

One of my iP6000D's has many clogged nozzles. I will try this approach and report back in many days.

 

[ghwellsjr]

One other thing you could do if you still have some of your compatible cartridges left (you did promise to recycle them at Staples for $3 each) is to make them into cleaning cartridges. An easy way to do this is turn them upside down and dribble Windex into the outlet ports until the sponges are saturated--you will see the colored Windex start to drip down from the sponge into the small open space. Or you could do this and refill them with Windex if there reservoirs have any room left in them. If you use cleaning cartridges, you won't have to remove the cartridges to put Windex on the inlet screens and you won't waste good ink.

 

[jbclem]

Reporting back...so far I've tried the Windex on the inlet screen 5 or 6 times, and the purge pad, not much change in the black ink, there's still some getting by the nozzles but not much. I've also dripped Windex into an empty cartridge and am using that in place of the black cartridge. You'll be happy to know I fixed the cyan problem by removing the yellow tape that I had somehow overlooked(duh, really duh!!!). So the problem now is only with the black ink.

Are these some more drastic measures I could try? Is there a reason why I shouldn't use straight rubbing alcohol instead of the Windex mix. And what about a cleaning with the Windex filled cartridge in place...would that put some force behind the Windex to make it penetrate more? What about a little compressed air blown through the black inlet screen...is it too delicate for that, and should I remove the printhead first. Is there a solvent that is specific for dry based ink, that might be much more effective...

If the purge pad is soaking the nozzles in Windex, perhaps removing the printhead might be a better way to try this with a Windex/alcohol/carburetor cleaner/hydrochloric acid filled container instead of the purge pad.

I keep on trying...

John

If I was seeing any improvement I could keep on with the Windex drip, but so far the nozzle checks don't look much better than the first time.

 

[ghwellsjr]

Let me see if I understand your current situation. All of your colors are printing well but your black has serious problems. Have you confirmed this with the extended nozzle check? To do this right you need to do a head cleaning after you install the cartridges. Then do the extended nozzle check. Report back the number of missing nozzles for each color, unless there is a very large number of missing nozzles, such as for the black. In that case, describe the pattern of missing nozzles--is it just a few rows or columns that are working? Is it every other nozzle that is working. If you have a scanner or a digital camera, it would be helpful to see that extended nozzle check.

While you are trying to clean your nozzles, you should remove all the cartridges I sent you and replace them with cleaning cartridges that you made out of your compatibles by dribbling Windex in the outlet ports. Then go through these steps:

1) Open the printer cover.
2) Put Windex on the purge pad.
3) Close the cover.
4) Do a head cleaning.
5) Do a nozzle check.

Repeat many times. When you want to quit for awhile, stop after you do step 3 and unplug the printer. When you start again, plug in the printer and continue the steps.

I realize you want quicker results, just like I do, but I have had bad luck trying to clean heads in other printers by removing them and soaking, blowing, sucking, etc. I hate to see you with not just a bad print head but also a damaged printer. That's why I urge you to follow these steps.

 

[ghwellsjr]

I forgot that I had promised to try to unclog one of my iP6000D's. When I started doing this last night, I realized that the process I outlined in the previous post won't work because this printer, as I already indicated, works differently than most other Canon printers. The problem is that when you stop at step 3, this printer does not raise the purge pad up to be in contact with the bottom of the print head like other models do. So now I'm trying to determine how soon after you hit the power button you should unplug the printer because this will raise the purge pad up but it probably also does an automatic purge before shutting down the power.

In the mean time, I would suggest that you simply tell the printer everything is OK after doing the last nozzle check and just leave it powered until the next time you want to try more cleanings.

 

[jbclem]

All colors, except black, seem to be working according to the extended nozzle check...although the yellow is so faint that it's hard to see the little boxes (but it was like that in the sample you sent). The black extended nozzle check is very difficult to read because what does print is faint. But what I see, of the two groups of boxes(3 rows each...each one for a different direction?): the top group of black boxes shows the middle row faintly, possibly the upper row very faintly, and it's impossible to tell if the bottom row is there. The bottom group of black boxes shows a very faint top row, and the other rows are impossible to tell if they are there.

As far as making all six cartridges into cleaning cartridges, that is a lot of work since it's not a quick process dripping Windex into each cartridge. If I set the printing to gray scale, will that restrict the cleaning cycle to the black cartridge/print head section, or does it always clean all colors (the ink levels are dropping)?

Yes, I'm getting a bit impatient...because I've been without a printer for months, and for a year before that I was beating my head against the wall with 3 different HP cp1160 printers that had constant off and on printhead problems, not to mention cartridge expirations , etc... I gave up on the cp1160's and looked for a printer with the old fashioned non-chip cartridges and came across many glowing reviews of the Canon ip4000r, ip5000, ip6000d...and had the incredible bad luck to end up with this one. Which printer do you think is the best of the non-chip types? Just in case I have to find another one.

 

[ghwellsjr]

I'm having a very difficult time understanding your extended nozzle check. It is supposed to print out three columns by four rows of grids. The first column of four grids on the left is different shades of cyan. The middle column of four grids is different shades of magenta. The last column on the right consists of two grids of the same shade of yellow on top and two grids of the same shade of black on the bottom. Don't worry about direction. Just describe which of these grid patterns is complete, which ones have a few missing horizontal segments and which ones have very few or no segments.

The cleaning action is performed by the purge pad moving up and contacting the bottom of the print head and then a pump sucks on the bottom of the purge pad which in turn sucks on all the nozzles. It's all or nothing. Gray scale or any other setting will have no effect on the nozzle checks.

I have not been able to figure out a good way to get your print head to soak in the Windex overnight on the purge pad. This printer just will not cooperate with my nefarious schemes. The best you can do is just put in your cleaning cartridges and leave them in with the power on or off overnight. I hope you are not putting Windex into the cartridge I sent you--they should only be used after many head cleanings/nozzle checks to see if there is any progress in unclogging because it is very difficult to see the segments when the ink is diluted with Windex.

At one point in my cleaning work on my iP6000D, the black stopped print completely. I removed the cartridges, did a deep head cleaning, removed the print head and cleaned the bottom of the print head and the contacts with a cotton swap soaked in Windex. After this, the black started printing again, but not immediately. I also swapped the black and magenta cartridges (full of ink) and did a head cleaning followed by a nozzle check. As soon as it worked, I put the cartridges back where they belonged. Currently, most of my colors are working except cyan.

Of the Canon printers you mentioned, the iP4000 is the best basic printer that uses the non-chipped cartridges. It usually is overpriced. The MP780 has identical print features but also has copy, scan, and fax. I would not buy one of these used printers with out seeing it and testing it first.

I recently bought an MX700 for a good price from egghead. It uses chips but there is a chip resetter available for it so it is almost as good as a chipless printer.

 

[jbclem]

New description of extended nozzle check: first two columns are ok, in the third column the yellow is too faint to discern a grid pattern (but it was also thus in the sample you sent). In the black part of the third column, in the top black grid you can see the middle horizontal segment but it's faint. The upper horizontal segment seems to be there but is very faint. The bottom horizontal segment is not discernible. Looking at the bottom black grid, the upper horizontal segment is just barely visible, the others aren't.

If the purge pad is not in place to suck at the nozzles, then it might be easiest to remove the printhead and let it set partially immersed in a pan with Windex. I have a hand vacuum pump and maybe I could apply some suction on the bottom of the printhead after the Windex soak has softened the ink up. How easy is it to remove the printhead? I thought I had a repair manual downloaded (with descriptions) but I haven't been able to find it lately.

Also, there must be a collection area below the purge pad that is getting full of Windex. Is there a way to get to it so I can remove the potential overflow?

John

 

[ghwellsjr]

It's very easy to remove the print head but I would advise that after you remove all the cartridges, you do a deep head cleaning to get rid of as much residual ink as you can. Then just raise the grey lever on the right side of the print head carriage and gently lift the print head out using one of the small black handles on either side of the print head.

And please don't be quick to put the print head back in the printer after any attempt at cleaning it. After drying it thoroughly with a paper towel or cloth, set the print head in a warm area for two days before putting it back in the printer.

Yes, the waste ink pads typically span the entire width of the printer in several levels and layers. See this post for what it looks like in one of Canon's all-in-ones.

 

[jbclem]

Just to be sure I understand, you're saying I can do a deep cleaning without the ink cartridges in place?

About drying the printhead, there are no warm areas in my house but how about a gentle blow drying with the hair dryer set on low.