Don’t use Cleaning cartridges in a 9500..

[The Hat]

I have just discovered a disastrous way to clean a 9500 print head.

I had a poor nozzle check on the red colour so I decided to try using a cleaning cartridge filled with Window cleaner and some washing up liquid in it.

It went from this …

While I was at it, the cyan was looking a bit shabby so I put in another cleaning cart in that colour too and ran one cleaning cycle then printed a nozzle check, that then had both colours missing as you would expect.

I exchanged the two cartridges with their proper colours and ran another cleaning cycle and nozzle check, it was exactly the same, and nothing appeared in the red and cyan segments.

Sort of shocked, I ran two more nozzle checks and they turned out the very same, the results were yet another print head dead due to my own stupidly and ignorance.
To this…

Now if you don’t want the same thing to happen to you then DON’T be tempted to print while you have cleaning carts installed, cleaning cycles are probably ok because the heads doesn’t fire during routine maintenance, but please remember not even a single nozzle check..

 

[palombian]

Strange.

I regularly cleaned my IX7000 and MX7600 when we were testing those Prodinks inks with cartridges filled with "pharmacist solution". No print head casualties.
Could it be that this solution (water and alcohols) is much closer to ink than water with ammonia and detergent ?

Recently laid up a 9500 II with cartridges full of "pharmacist print head preservation fluid", hope this will not ruin the head.

I have several Canon dye printers that I temporarily lay up - and take in service again - that way, most even with standard "pharmacist solution", and use nozzles checks to verify if all ink is flushed, no problems until now.

I can't believe you burned the Red and Cyan nozzles with a nozzle check, maybe a night of soaking will help ?
Did you try other carts ?

 

[mikling]

Try backflushing the printhead by placing the nozzle plate under a stream of water. It is possible that the Windex caused pigment to separate and settle onto the nozzle plate and there is a layer of pigment particles blocking the flow. Reverse the direction of the normal ink flow.

Are you still using the Freedom fill with the clip to speed the fill?

 

[martin0reg]

A siimilar question which actually concerns me: what properties or ingredients make a bubblejet ink, other than a piezo ink?
http://forum.luminous-landscape.com/index.php?topic=108569.0

Most experts say you can't use an epson (piezo) ink in a canon printer.
So you probably have to use a different composition for cleaning carts too.
Otherwise the printhead, i.e. the nozzles may not be able to build up drops or to keep the nozzles clean and firing, so my speculation.

But which composition is right .. that is the question..

..
I regularly cleaned my IX7000 and MX7600 when we were testing those Prodinks inks with cartridges filled with "pharmacist solution". No print head casualties.
Could it be that this solution (water and alcohols) is much closer to ink than water with ammonia and detergent ?
...

That is interesting and I will try it on a small pixma.
Do you add some ink to see what is going on?

 

[The Hat]

I regularly cleaned my IX7000 and MX7600 when we were testing those Prodinks inks with cartridges filled with "pharmacist solution". No print head casualties.
Could it be that this solution (water and alcohols) is much closer to ink than water with ammonia and detergent ?

I popped in a cleaning cart without thinking and yes pharmacist solution would have been much better, after all I use glop almost weekly in all the cartridges without incident, as I said I’m an idiot.

Try backflushing the printhead by placing the nozzle plate under a stream of water. It is possible that the Windex caused pigment to separate and settle onto the nozzle plate and there is a layer of pigment particles blocking the flow. Reverse the direction of the normal ink flow.

I’ll try back flushing but I reckon this issue is electrical and not a blockage, it happened to fast to be anything else.

I haven’t given up on the head just yet, it hurts to much to just let go without a fight, but in the back of my mind I know its hopeless, I’m out of the plane now and didn’t think I needed a parachute for such a short drop.

Are you still using the Freedom fill with the clip to speed the fill?

I have always used my freedom method for refill and only dribble for topping up, why would I change something that works and I also store my cartridges with the clips up.

This head is 3 years old but I have been working it hard for the past week doing lots of large solids on A3 size, these heads don’t need an excuse to just stop working, it just happened out of the blue, I have used Propylene Glycol/Alcohol mix before to dilute an ink colour without problems.

Thanks for all the good suggestion..

 

[palombian]

...
That is interesting and I will try it on a small pixma.
Do you add some ink to see what is going on?

The IX7000 and MX7600 are pigment (piezo) printers, but I do the same as with my dye Pixma's.
Since I use empty 3th party cartridges (I find in the printers I buy second hand) to reset and refill with pharmacist solution, actually there is some ink in it and I can verify the nozzles. I think dye ink mixes better with water/alcohol solutions than pigment ink.

 

[martin0reg]

There are the different colorants, dye and pigment.
And besides there is ink or ink base for different methods of building and firing the droplets, i.e. for canon bubble-jet and epson piezo.

..
..I reckon this issue is electrical and not a blockage, it happened to fast to be anything else.
...

If there is any truth in my speculation, that the cleaning solution was impossible to be fired by the bubblejet nozzles, the (probably) electronical blockage might be the result, because a nozzle row printing without ink (here: cleaning solution) may be detected somehow.

And there may be a chance that this blockage is temporary...
http://www.printerknowledge.com/thr...amaged-head-in-your-printer.10632/#post-89219

 

[mikling]

I popped in a cleaning cart without thinking and yes pharmacist solution would have been much better, after all I use glop almost weekly in all the cartridges without incident, as I said I’m an idiot.

I’ll try back flushing but I reckon this issue is electrical and not a blockage, it happened to fast to be anything else.

I haven’t given up on the head just yet, it hurts to much to just let go without a fight, but in the back of my mind I know its hopeless, I’m out of the plane now and didn’t think I needed a parachute for such a short drop.

I have always used my freedom method for refill and only dribble for topping up, why would I change something that works and I also store my cartridges with the clips up.

This head is 3 years old but I have been working it hard for the past week doing lots of large solids on A3 size, these heads don’t need an excuse to just stop working, it just happened out of the blue, I have used Propylene Glycol/Alcohol mix before to dilute an ink colour without problems.

Thanks for all the good suggestion..

I thought you were. What seems fast and cheery might have some unintended long term issues and I think there is a correlation.

The red streaks is a situation of the IS red 6164 and its sensitivity to cart condition similar to 6162 magenta which also displays this similar sensitivity as a result of highly loaded pigment. ( One big reason for my new 9500 inkset. When I see an issue, I try to fix it.) Pigment buildup in the pad is the key aspect of this slow buildup when the freedom is used because it does not redisperse the settled and trapped pigment particles in the pads. As the pads dry out the ink in the pad becomes overloaded with pigment and it deposits. Dribbling over the pad, redisperses the pigment back into the incoming ink and redistributes it over the whole contents of the ink inside. The freedom method concentrate the flow in one spot and does not wash out the whole pad. Just something to consider...I am all in the dribble because it puts a stress free and reliable situation for the long term and has many positive benefits. Another one is that it proves that the diaphragm system is fully working when refilling. I have seen some diaphragm mechanisms stick during refill as well and it it does not expand back on its own, then I might not trust the cart.

 

[rodbam]

My red channel had a very similar nozzle check to yours Hat & my twice cleaned head did not improve it. Because I have a new head coming & wanted to flush some of my new formulation inks through the carts to make sure they are working right before putting them in the new head I printed up about 5 or 6 A3+ plus pictures of some reddish flowers not worrying if it burnt the red channel & low & behold the red channel now gives a good nozzle check.

 

[palombian]

Good to hear this !

IMO as long as a print head is not electrically dead (error B200 and the like) it is recoverable, at least for some time.
There are some signs in the nozzle check (lateral displacements) announcing electrical problems, but I managed to print a full year (on a MX7600) before the head finally was rejected.