Canon ip6000d printing is very light

[ghwellsjr]

Yes, with the chipless cartridges, a Canon printer can't tell the difference between a full cartridge and a missing cartridge--that's one of the reasons they put chips in their cartridges, so a deep cleaning with no cartridges present will serve to suck most of the ink out of the print head. If you place a drop or two of Windex on the screens where the ink goes into the print head, you can help clean out the ink. You can also do a nozzle check to make sure nothing prints and repeat a couple times until nothing prints during a nozzle check.

I don't think you want to leave a hair dryer running for two days. Place the print head on top of your refrigerator near the back. It puts out warm air.

 

[jbclem]

Well, it's been a while since I've posted, and although I'm still trying to clear this printhead I'm ready to give up. Results so far, after a couple of weeks of soaking the printhead in warm Windex, and also drizzling Windex through the printhead black intake, and also blotting the printhead in Windex soaked paper towels...the black nozzle check has improved from a very faint pattern to a noticiable pattern that is missing many parts. But I've emptied half of the ink cartridges (kindly send by ghwellsjr) and am using some of the original cheapo inks, but now completely out of yellow. And the eBay vendor has offered to refund my money and even send a pickup slip for the printer. And I've acquired (for $8) an ip5000 with a stuck printhead carriage. So unless there are some novel suggestions, it may be time to move on to the next problem.

Thanks to all, and especially ghwellsjr, for the continual help. I'm afraid I'll be back asking for more of the same, but what a resource this website it! It shows the real value of the internet, not as a massive commercial entity, but as a way that people around the world share their knowledge and desire to help each other. If only our political parties would do the same...

 

[ghwellsjr]

Sorry it hasn't worked out in a successful way but at least the buyer is making it good for you. Don't forget to recycle the extra cartridge a Staples for $3 each.

 

[jbclem]

Well, I'm back...I kept trying even after I gave up. I ended up soaking the printhead in warm/hot (120 deg) isopropyl alcohol and after a number of times the black unclogged. The printer would then print in black, but if I let it sit unused for a few days, it would clog up again. I had to repeat the warm/hot soak a few more times before this stopped. The black seems to be working now.

But here are some more problems that have cropped up. One is that the alignment is way off, with letters almost double printing. I've been trying the realignment process, but with limited success. The other problem is that some colors seem to be blended in the nozzle test, even though I haven't mixed the positions of the ink cartridges. And when I print in grayscale, I'm getting a reddish black text. I'm wondering if the 120 deg soaking might have damaged something inside the printhead created some blending between colors.

On the alignment test: I'm following the instructions, entering the numbers "with the least amount of streaking"...but I'm not sure what the phrase means in the context. The alignment printout shows columns A through G, each with rows +7 through -3. The individual sectors show 10 distinct bars, or light bars, or barely visible bars, or no visible bars. I'm been picking the sectors with the distinct bars and entering their numbers, but sometimes there will be many identical sectors in one column so it's hard to chose. But my method of chosing the more distinct sectors is not working and actually made the alignment problem worse. Can someone help me out with this?

On the blending problem, I'm puzzled...especially when I get reddish black text when I print a grayscale test print. The black cartridge is still pretty full looks very black, and it's in the correct position in the printhead, as are all the other cartridges. Any ideas about this?

 

[ghwellsjr]

You need to select the alignment patterns that show no striping or the least amount. See if your blending problem goes away when you do this.

As far as the "clogs" go after letting it sit a few days, see if successive nozzle checks repeat the same bad nozzles or does every nozzles check show different bad nozzles, and by that I mean some that were bad become good and vice versa.

I have a print head that behaves that way to and I'm wondering if some internal seals are leaking and although you can get it to work after a lot of cleanings, when it sits around for a day, maybe some air gets into the ink passageway causing some nozzle to appear as though they are clogged.

 

[jbclem]

I did the alignment the way you suggested, it's much easier to make the choices that way. Except for the first column, there was usually one (at most two) obvious choice. In the first column the rows were almost identical, perhaps the bars (or stripes) were slightly thicker is some, but all were distinct. Anyway, the problem wasn't fixed, in a test print the letters are still doubling up/overlapping, and each period shows as two dots. Should I try loosening and moving the printhead around a bit? Or is it self-centering?

The clogging problem resolved itself a while back. The color blending/mixing problem is persisting. I just tried a test print in grayscale mode, and this time it printed all black text (the logo at the top fo the page had some dark/blackish colors)...two days ago the test print resulted in reddish black text. Is there any way that colors could mix in the printhead?

 

[ghwellsjr]

Regarding the alignment, all I can suggest is that you try different values for the first column and see if it results in a better printout. On my MP780's one of the colors always produces distinct bars. I don't know if that is normal. Sometime, I will take a look at different printers to see how they differ.

Moving the print head won't make any difference. The alignment has to do with overlapping the nozzles used when the print head is moving in one direction versus the nozzles used when printing in the other direction.

Yes, if there is a leak in the seals inside the print head, colors can mix. To find out if this is a problem, remove all you cartridges, put a drop of Windex on the inlet screens, do a deep head cleaning followed by a nozzle check. Repeat until nothing prints. Then put one cartridge in, do a normal cleaning and a nozzle check. You should see only one or two patterns (for the same color) printing. If you see one color showing up in a different color's position, then you know there is an internal leak.

 

[jackhookss]

You need to make some adjustment with the settings with the printing options or something wrong with the quality of cartridges quality that hampers printing quality. Check that out and get the solution.