Help Major Issues Refilling Canon 526 Colours With Clogged Print Heads

[printermayhem]

Hi Folks,

I have been refilling Canon 520 / 512 inks for some time and with the introduction of the canon ip4800 / 4850 we went over to refilling 525 / 526.

This went fine for almost a year and then I think we had a bad batch of cyan ink or something (could it be an ink supply issue?) and all almost all the heads in the 8+ printers we have started intermittently clogging this was a disaster and most are on location with our staff - the prints came out very red with no cyan showing, this never seemed to happen with ANY other colour.

We had to replace a few of the printers and changed ink supplier and we are still getting the problem intermittently.

So my questions are these:

1 - Has anyone else seen this and what can clean the print head (is it damaged beyond repair) we have tried compressed air, luke warm water etc - Do ultrasonic cleaners work?

2 - we have tried refilling the cartridges by drilling a hole at the ink sponge and sticking a syringe through the sponge and into the ink tank to refil, and slowly adding ink and checking the weight - we don't cover any holes or do anything else, we don't flush, shouldwe?? we also tried the top drill method with poor results. Is the first method the best way - it seems to give us the best results?! - Someone talked about their needing to be a vacuum in the tank is that true if so how do you create it??

3 - can you buy replacement ink heads anywhere in the uk for the canon 4950?

4- how many times can we keep refilling the ink cartridges for? i have a lot of 520 / 521 empties but they look dried out could they be used?

I would greatly appreciate any help we are a small business and each member of staff uses about 2 / 3 full sets of ink+ per week refilling saves us a huge amount of money. It is becoming such a problem for some reason.

 

[The Hat]

Hi printermayhem
If you have been continual printing while you have poor or no ink flow then your print head is probably burned out,
a Canon print head cannot be used for any length of time without ink passing through it.

What you need to do is to use your old 520/521 cartridges in place of these 525/526s and just swap over the chips
from one set of carts to the other to make them acceptable to your newer printer. (Easier to refill)

If your print head is beyond saving then Google for a replacement head,
there are dozens of places in the UK to get one.

Cartridges can be refilled indefinitely but may from time to time need cleaning out
(Purging) when they start to show signs of poor ink flow.

Here is a link to refilling a cartridge also how to swap over the chips
and a quick way to dry your cartridges after cleaning them,
plus a place to get the best inks from, and anything else you may need.

If you intend to refill regularly then you need to have at least one sets of spare cartridges
so you dont have to stop printing just to do a refill
plus it is vital to have a chip resetter to have proper ink control,

http://www.nifty-stuff.com/forum/viewtopic.php?pid=41631#p41631
http://www.nifty-stuff.com/forum/viewtopic.php?pid=40766#p40766
http://www.nifty-stuff.com/forum/viewtopic.php?pid=34175#p34175
Included a link for a proper refilling procedure.
http://www.nifty-stuff.com/forum/viewtopic.php?pid=50726#p50726
http://www.octoink.co.uk/categories...ble/CLI%2d526-{47}-PGI%2d525/?setCurrencyId=1

 

[printermayhem]

Hello there, thanks for the response.

I am now using Greentrees for ink and I am happy with the quality, I have also just purchased 2 new print heads.

I have approx 150 of each 521 cartridge so will start converting them to 526's (have chip resetters for both).

What is not clear is when using our preferred german method should any of the holes be covered whilst refilling - we turn the cartridge exit hole up and slowly fill with the syringe.

Also all the 521 cartridges are completely empty but have a little ink on the sponges do they need cleaned first prior to filling or would it be ok to proceed, if not how can you flush the cartrdiges?

Thanks for the help.

 

[The Hat]

Purging a cartridge can be done in several ways, it will depend how much time you want to spent doing it.

It can be achieved quicker and easier if you have some sort of hole in the top
of the reservoir by drilling or removing the ball in the original fill hole under the label.

http://www.nifty-stuff.com/forum/viewtopic.php?pid=59370#p59370

Here is a link to probably the best tutorial on the German refill method.

http://www.nifty-stuff.com/forum/viewtopic.php?id=4315