Refilling Canon Pixma ip4700 ?

[d1hamby]

wixwix, I've been refilling cartridges for over a decade and it is a tricky thing to find the right solution for each person. Lately I've been finding these are the easiest and cheapest to use and refill:
http://cgi.ebay.com/15P-PGI-220-CLI...cmdZViewItemQQptZBI_Toner?hash=item5ad4fbc42e
Since your printer uses the same ink cartridges as the MP620 and this seems to be the one with the most results on ebay that is what you should use when searching. They also come in 5 and 10 packs.

 

[leo8088]

D1hamby, I would avoid using any non OEM ink cartridges. Those autoreset chips will reset each time you turn on and off the printer which makes the ink level status useless. This isn't that bad but using non OEM ink cartridges is potentially fatal to the print head.

Using non OEM ink cartridges, especially ones that feed ink to the print head with an insufficient ink flow, causes the nozzles over heated. They may work fine for a while. But sooner or later the print head dies. This could take a few weeks to a year or two and you may not be aware that the print head is suffering before it dies.

The best and safest practice is as The Hat suggested to refill OEM (Canon original) cartridges with good quality ink that is recommended by people who have used it successfully. Using a bad ink (incorrectly formulated or universal ink) can result in incorrect ink flow too. The result of using non OEM cartridges and refilling with bad ink is premature failure of the print head. Some people complained that their Canon printer short lived. I have been burnt before. Been there done that and several printers lost. I finally found Hobbicolors ink and my ip4300, MP780 and ip8500 have lived 4+ years all using OEM ink cartridges. My ip8600 finally died and it was really old so it wasn't too bad.

Finding a good ink that is really safe is tricky. It's not an easy thing to judge an ink without long term using it. But heavy duty printing will usually reveal the fact if the ink is correctly formulated. A marginal quality ink can kill a print head in a few sessions of heavy duty printing. If only light printing is ever given to the printer it may take a year or longer to kill the print head. But it is very likely before a print head dies you will see symptoms of problems, making you to do manual cleaning cycles more frequent than you should and it fills up the waste ink tank sooner than it should. All that may lead pros to claim that Canon print heads have a short life expectancy. It is simply not true.

Do what The Hat suggested. Refill OEM ink cartridges with one of the ink brands he mentioned. Your printer will be on a trouble free journey for many years.

 

[Two_Metre_Man]

Hy, Guys!!

Another newbie here, with a related question.

I recently bought a new IP4700 when my old Canon IP5000 died. I was happily refilling the oem cartridges in the IP5000 with inks from Computer Friends Inc of Portland OR, but they seem to have vanished from the web - ?? I have quite a bit of their inks still on hand for the older Canon (IP5000) and I am wondering if I can simply go ahead and refill these new oem cartridges in the new IP4700 with the same inks and in the same way?? I just spotted that both the black reservoirs in the IP4700 are dry, too.........

Many thanks for any and all advice!

George

P.S: I was top-filling using syringes, by the way.

 

[ghwellsjr]

I don't know about the ink in the cartridges that are in the iP4700 but I do know that Canon made a change when they first went from the chipless cartridges that are used in the iP5000 to the CLI-8 line of chipped cartridges. Here is a graph that shows the difference in the cyan and magenta inks. The major change was in the magenta. They may have since made more changes.

 

[Two_Metre_Man]

I don't know about the ink in the cartridges that are in the iP4700 but I do know that Canon made a change when they first went from the chipless cartridges that are used in the iP5000 to the CLI-8 line of chipped cartridges. Here is a graph that shows the difference in the cyan and magenta inks. The major change was in the magenta. They may have since made more changes.

Although it may elicit howls of anguish (!), I seldom print photographs, only documents with colour, so the tonal accuracy is of less importance to me. My main concern is whether these older inks are compatible with the new cartridges and printer technology - ???

Again, thanks for all help and advice.

George

 

[The Hat]

Two_Metre_Man

First of all welcome, using the old ink would be all right depending on how old is old.
The pigment black on the ip4700 is a different black than on the ip5000, so you could have problems there anyway.
The 4700 uses chip cartridges so you will need a chip resetter if you intend to continue refilling the OEM cartridges.
My advice to you would be to find an ink supplier on this tread thats near to where you live and get all new fresh ink + a chip resetter and your troubles will be few ok..

 

[Two_Metre_Man]

Two_Metre_Man

First of all welcome, using the old ink would be all right depending on how old is old.
The pigment black on the ip4700 is a different black than on the ip5000, so you could have problems there anyway.
The 4700 uses chip cartridges so you will need a chip resetter if you intend to continue refilling the OEM cartridges.
My advice to you would be to find an ink supplier on this tread thats near to where you live and get all new fresh ink + a chip resetter and your troubles will be few ok..

Thanks for the welcome, The Hat, and I hear ya about getting new ink! Just trying to save some $$$s, that's all!! I saw a chip resetter in another thread (available here ), posted by nhendrix on 07/20/2010 for about $20, which seems like a good deal. I am also reading that Hobbicolor inks are good (?) for the Canon IP4700, so I'd better obtain a set of those pronto! However, in looking at their website just now, they are saying that their WC-6 inks are only compatible with Canon's BCI ink cartridges, whereas the IP4700 uses CLI-221 and PGI-220. Hmmmm......

Damn, it irks me to throw all that ink away, though!! :/ I so love standardisation!!!

Cheers!

George

 

[ghwellsjr]

If you are not particular about tonal accuracy, I would go ahead and use the old ink. Any ink that worked in the iP5000 which has 1 pl nozzles will work in the current Canon printers. This assumes that the ink does not have any particulate matter in it.

 

[Two_Metre_Man]

If you are not particular about tonal accuracy, I would go ahead and use the old ink. Any ink that worked in the iP5000 which has 1 pl nozzles will work in the current Canon printers. This assumes that the ink does not have any particulate matter in it.

The ink is fine to the best of my knowledge - never had any issues with it in the old printer - pricewise, it was as cheap to buy new as try to repair the old one. Didn't make much financial sense to do otherwise.

Thanks very much for that information, ghwellsjr. Now to get that chip resetter!!

George

 

[websnail]

Did a little look back and here's a quick rundown on what changed.

BCI6/3eBK -> CLI-8/PGI-5 Changes:
- Photo Black
- Magenta

CLI-8/PGI-5 -> CLI-521/PGI-520 (same as 221/220) Changes:
- Pigment Black
- Cyan

So between the two you've got four inks out of five (the yellow being the only exception) that have changed.

As much as anything else you might want to take heart from the fact that ink does age and eventually develops algae, promoting clogging, etc... so fresh ink is probably a good idea anyway.

But there you go in terms of the changes...

As always, hope it helps

Martin