Grandad's cleaning method for BCI-3eBK

[on30trainman]

fotofreek,
Got my squeeze bottles, needles and bottle caps from Howard Electronics today (Saturday) - nice quick delivery. They work very well for me - the 1.5" needles work fine for me. Used them to load a set of Hobbicolor cartridges with their newer UW-8 inks. Very much easier than trying to use that syringe that comes with the kit. No more worries about bumping over an open ink bottle when I am sticking the syringe into it. Much less mess and ink on my hands. The messiest job was pouring the ink from the supplied bottles into the squeeze bottles. Got to find myself a small funnel that will fit in the squeeze bottles. Decided to use the Luer Lock caps to seal the bottles rather than try a needle tip cap. Put a needle on each bottle, fill the cartridges and seal with the top cap when I am done. Then clean all the needles at one time. Refilling is almost fun now. Sure glad I saw your post about using those bottles.
But as said, I now have a lifetime (or more) supply of needles and caps. Anyone want to buy some? Good deal - maybe!!

Steve W.

 

[martin]

I've been refilling my Canon BCI-24 black and 3-colour cartridges for some 18 months now and I think the cartridges might be getting tired. I've ordered new Canon carts but plan to experiment with the old ones. I understand the ink is pigmented not dye-based. I ran some ammonia over a print: the colour gets turned pink but any black print tends to remain, which makes me wonder has anyone found a more effective solvent than ammonia?

Secondly, I'm considering removing the top of the cartridge and lifting out the sponge materials to clean them rather than trying to flush and dry a cart. (I'd refix the top with a glue gun.) Has anyone ever tried this?

By the way, the refill ink I've been using I got from InkReloaded. The colour seems a very good match to the original Canon colour, but I've found that greys have a distinct green hue. Any comments on this?

Thanks

 

[mikling]

I've taken a range of Canon Blacks and streaked them on piece of paper with a swab. There are at least 5 or 6 blacks in the dye range and two additional pigment blacks. Each has a different cast. The dye blacks in the newer machines with the chips CLI are distinctly different from the BCI- blacks. There is no such thing as a general Canon Black I hope your vendor is not substituting one for the other.

 

[martin]

I have opened up my black Canon original BCI-24 cartridge and am posting my findings. I have refilled the black and colour carts, through the ink outlet sponge, for the past 2 years and had noticed a fall-off in the colour quality which I put down to evaporation of the ink carrier leaving behind a build up of pigment. Whatever the cause, I decided to replace the carts and open up and try and rejuvenate the old ones.

I carefully prised off the top of the black cart with a sharp knife - much easier than I expected. I do mean the top of the cart, not the outer cap. With the top off, the sponge was visible inside the cart. The top is far more basic than the descriptions I have read. There are no galleries; there is one tiny vent hole leading straight through to the underside. (There are 3 blind holes on the outside - they do not communicate with the interior.) The sponge comes out easily enough as does the small black pad at the exit/delivery point in the base.

The sponge and the pad wash clean easily in water. I have added a bit of ammonia and shook the sponge and pad in a container but I think the water did a fine job of cleaning them. I'll dry them and refit and refill and see how I get on. It's turned out far easier than I thought it would. I will post again if I run into problems of any sort either with the refilling or with the disassembly of the colour cart.

Martin

 

[martin]

I have now disassembled my BCI-24 colour cartridge. Prising the top off was slightly more difficult than on the black cart, but still relatively easy. The sponges came out easily together with the 4mm square pad that sits behind the delivery outlet. They washed clean without much trouble in water and there were patches where the colour seemed dried in. Contrary to what I've read, the sponge material didn't seem particularly high-tech and apparently no more absorbent than other types of absorbent material. Reassembly was easy. Beforehand I sanded flat the edges of the top of the case. I ran a fine strip of hot meltable glue along all the edges of the compartments. I then remelted it with a hair dryer evenly and reseated the top and held it in place until the glue cooled. It's important of course to ensure there is no possibility of ink leaking between the compartments. It's not feasible to test to see if the glue has perfectly sealed each compartment, but avoiding overfilling should certainly ensure that even if the seal is not perfect, there should be no liquid free to migrate.

I have not yet refilled the carts, believing it's best to wait until I am ready to use them. Nevertheless, I am surprised by how easy and effective the job was.

 

[martin]

I have now refilled the cleaned empty cartridges as detailled above. A point to note is that it is worth filing down the sides of the colur cart until they are a milimetre or so lower than the 2 walls that separate the 3 colour cavities. This way, you can be sure that the lid is making contact with the separating walls fully this minimising the chance of cross contamination. You then run round the edges - after the lid has set - with the hot glue to fill the gaps. Any excess must be trimmed with a sharp blade otherwise the carts don't fit back in the printer. The use of hot melt glue is good - use the hairdryer to disassemble. Seems to work fine. No major problems.

 

[martin]

Slight setback: the hot-melt glue is not sufficieantly well bonded to prevent leakage. After a week or so, I got leakage between 2 compartments. I removed and cleaned the sponges, removed the glue remnants and this time used epoxy (Araldite) slow-setting. The bond is better but again will, with a knife come apart. So far so good. I coated both surfaces of the adjoining compartments in the body and the lid and let the adhesive start to go off for an hour or 2 and then put both pieces together and clamped them for a day. Then I went round the edges with Araldite to seal the gap, let that set and then sanded down so there was nothing the stop the cartridge going back in the slot. You only need a slight bulge to cause a problem.