Pgi9 life span

[rodbam]

I did post this a few days ago in the older thread on my pro9500 magenta problems but no one has responded & I was wondering if it's because of the old thread or I have been sent to Coventry. Anyhow I will repost it in a new thread because it seems that my magenta Pgi9 carts went bad after less then 10 refills (poss 7 refills).....................................
(my post from 2 days ago)
"Well it looks like I owe The Hat a beer, I put my money on the ink being bad causing my strange looking magenta problems because I couldn't believe both magenta carts going bad on me. I have now received my new ink from Precision Colors & the problem remains with both old cartridges, so even with the high storage temps down here the ink must still be OK. The final proof of everything will be when I refill my new OEM cart with IS ink after the OEM ink has run out.
My carts would have only been refilled 10 or less times so does this suggest they have a short life? I also wonder if I'm overfilling them because the new OEM carts weigh just over 30g & I have been refilling to 31g to 32g.
The Colormunki patches are not improved with the new ink in the old cart but the nozzle check looks a bit better but it still has a magenta bleed off the vertical black lines"
The new nozzle check with the new ink & old cart is here, I couldn't upload them here for some reason.
http://www.printerknowledge.com/threads/magenta-problems-pro9500.8564/page-3

 

[The Hat]

No Rod your post didn’t end up been ignored so you can cancel your travel plans for now.

It is most unusual that you’ve had two cartridge failures especially after only refilling 7 + times because I had to get a couple of new sets of cartridges from Mikling after I stopped drilling holes in my original set when I made up my new refill adaptors.

Since then I have refilled some of the cartridges more than forty + times and only had an ink flow problem with two of my MBK cartridges, I originally taught it was a head clog !

After a good wash out with warm water and the now Famous Fairy liquid I’ve had no problems since, one of my red cartridges went the same way and was cure quickly using this same method.

I don’t know how old my current set of cartridges are but I’d say yours are a lot younger than mine are and shouldn’t be giving you the problems your having, could it be the way you store them, mine are keep upside down (Ha Ha like in Auss) with the outlets face up.

You could also try giving all of your cartridges a good shake for at least ten seconds once a week to reactivate and maintain good suspension of the pigment in the inks ! Everything helps no matter how crazy it sounds.

Have a good Paddy’s Day in Brissie and enjoy the day out with a few photos and plenty of beer..

 

[rodbam]

Thanks Hat I will try & play with one of the (bad) carts & see how that goes although I did a really good flush on one & it looked spotless. If all else fails I will just buy another OEM so I have a spare. I will also try the upside down storage & increase my beer intake

 

[The Hat]

To really give these cartridges a good clean out use a refill clip on the outlet and a large syringe with warn water and a few drops of washing up liquid, then inject the solution into the cart and then suck it out again do this about six times and then use clean water twice more. (This only works for PGI-9’s)

When you’re finished with the water put about 3 ml of ink into the cart and give the cart a good shake then suck out that ink and dump it (Waste), now refill as you normally would with good ink and your cart is good to go again..

Here’s a tip for exchanging cartridges, if you have any spare other colour carts that you’re not using then use one of them, giving it the same purging procedure as suggested, the labels on these carts are easy to remove so you can rebadged it as if it were an original one.
One further tip.. Do nothing till your over the festivities and your hangover improves mate..

 

[palombian]

Some beginners observations/questions at this point, Hat:

- First of all I can confirm the PGI-9 cartridges are very easy to refill.
- I did the above cleaning one a few cartridges who were dried out or contaminated with another color, but they didn't deliver enough ink for printing (nozzle checks were ok). Is it possible the cleaning changes the behaviour of the thin sponge layer, and how to remediate this ? At the end a fresh Canon cartridge is the easiest solution.
- If you "rebadge" a cartridge for use with another colour, I suppose you have to transfer the chip also ?

 

[The Hat]

The PGI-9 cart is the easiest of all OEM carts to refill bar none.
If you cleaned out a cart and after refilling it still couldn’t deliver sufficient enough ink for good quality printing than your cleaning method or the solution used did not remove all of the offending dried ink.

These OEM carts are very robust and it would take the wrong type of chemicals in cleaning them to damage the outlet sponge, and buying a replacement cart would then be the wisest choice if the sponge had been damaged in that process.

The PGI-9 cartridge is fairly unique because it’s so easy to clean them out and use them for another colour without getting any cross contamination plus the top label can be removed without tearing it and the chip itself can be transferred to a new cart with ease also so yes fairly unique I’d say..

 

[rodbam]

Hat, One of the bad carts had a Rolls Royce clean & it was spotless but still it didn't perform properly. I was wondering if the blowing up & sucking the bag back in may have altered the way it works but you have done it enough times with no problems so maybe something in both carts just started malfunctioning.
Palombian, Yes you would have to swap the chips to use another colour cart.

 

[Emulator]

All this high tech stuff, I thought Aus was a land of sheep and roos and beer of course.

 

[palombian]

The PGI-9 cart is the easiest of all OEM carts to refill bar none.
If you cleaned out a cart and after refilling it still couldn’t deliver sufficient enough ink for good quality printing than your cleaning method or the solution used did not remove all of the offending dried ink.

These OEM carts are very robust and it would take the wrong type of chemicals in cleaning them to damage the outlet sponge, and buying a replacement cart would then be the wisest choice if the sponge had been damaged in that process.

The PGI-9 cartridge is fairly unique because it’s so easy to clean them out and use them for another colour without getting any cross contamination plus the top label can be removed without tearing it and the chip itself can be transferred to a new cart with ease also so yes fairly unique I’d say..

Some thoughts on my learning process in this amazing activity:

Since I also had a printing problem (see MX7600 banding thread) with a fresh Canon magenta cartridge refilled with I.S. ink I have some concerns about the feasability of the refill.
At least with the magenta.
I refilled most colours of recent stock OEM cartridges with I.S. ink on the MX7600 and PRO9500 without problems.
Will recheck the magenta on the PRO9500.

I will concentrate now on correct refilling of known good cartridges.
My actual procedure is, when one or several cartridges show low level, to remove all cartridges under 50%, reset, top by dripping ink on the sponge until 30.50 g (Canon cartridges weight varies from 30.35 to 30.85), press slightly to check for air bubbles, and replace immediatily.
So I do not wait until they are empty, do not suck air out, and certainly do not rinse.

Although I.S. states their inks can be mixed with OEM, there is a small chance the magenta cannot.
It cannot be excluded that the print head of the MX7600 behaves differently.

Separetily I'll try to master the cartridge reconditioning.
I observed the surface structure of the sponge changes after rinsing with warm (distilled) water, with or without some drops of window cleaner or washing up liquid, 20% isopropanol or whatever.
Refilling did not change this (the rough mesh pattern does not come back).
These cartridges did not deliver ink as they should do.
For sure I applied this on very badly treated cartridges and my experience must not be generalised.
I will get some propylene glycol to brew the pharmacist solution, hope this helps.

Anyway, the life span of the OEM cartridges is an important factor for refilling.

 

[The Hat]

There are a few things I reckon you might think of changing in your refill procedure (1) is not to leave your print head without cartridges while you’re refilling your empties, you might consider having a spare set available.

(2) make sure you give your refill ink bottles a very good shake before attempting to refill any of the cartridges first !

(3) Remember also to give you cartridges a good shake before putting them back into the print head, and you should also consider changing all of the cartridges together even ones that still look full, it does saves ink in the long run.

If you intend to flush out any of your cartridges a refill clip is all most essential to get a good proper rinse out and when you’re finished there is no need to dry the cartridge just refill it with 2 ml of ink and then empty that out again (Dump) and now you can refill your cartridge in confidence with whatever method you choose to do so.

As for as I.S. pigment ink is concerned when it comes to being compatible with OEM ink (Mixing) I have not found a single problem with it, and I’d be the first to howl if I did.

I’ve been using I.S. ink for over four years now and have never found the slightest problem with its compatibility to mix with any other inks that I’ve used, I still mix Chinese, I.S. and OEM inks together on occasions without noticing the slightest problem..