Steaking after usage

[snowmexican]

Recently I have been noticing that my printer (Pro 100) will now have an issue where after it sits idle for a while it will print one or two pages well, but then after it will start to have streaking (typically in the same area).
If I let it sit and run a nozzle check it will come back perfect, if I then run a cleaning or print a full page, and print another nozzle check I get an obvious streak on the M channel currently.
I am running OEM ink, all new cartridges.


This is after sitting for a while
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This is after one cleaning cycle
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(these were done less than a min apart just a cleaning cycle between them)
Any help will be much appreciated

 

[stratman]

Some questions:

• Have you always uses OEM Canon cartridges? Ever refiiled?
• Any other issues with the printer?
• How old are the ink cartridges?
• How often do you print something that uses all the cartridges. This includes nozzle checks, the easiest and least costly way to exercise the printer and all it's cartridges to keep clogs away?
• Did the Magenta issue appear suddenly? Is it getting better, worse or staying the same?
• Did the Magenta issue begin after a specific event, like after changing the cartridge?
• Have you tried a different Magenta cartridge?

What you describe is ink starvation which typically is due to poor ink flow through the sponge of the cartridge. Once ink in the lower portion of the sponge is used up during a print job, the printer will need time to "rest" so that ink can replenish/flow to the "empty" portion of the sponge and then be ready to provide ink during printing. When ink demand out paces ink flow in the sponge then the streaks of missing ink reoccurs.

This typically occurs when one reuses a cartridge for refilling and overtime the ink begins to dry out in/on the sponge when it is exposed to air as you use up the ink. Hence recommendations to refill cartridges when marked as "Low" and not "Empty.

But, you said you use new OEM Canon cartridges, ie not refill. So, could it be a malfunctioning cartridge?

The cartridge has an air vent to allow equalization of atmospheric pressure inside with the outside air pressure. If the air vent is blocked then negative pressure inside the cartridge may build up as you continue to print and you will get failure of ink flow and streaks of missing ink on the paper. Check to see that all wrapping meant to be removed is removed. The Canon label with the name Canon and the color of the cartridge is supposed to stay on.

For more on the air vent see @paulcroft 's excellent post here. The last picture shows the air vent and there is a discussion of it as well.

That printing appears within normal limits if you let the printer "rest" for a while, but then the ink starvation returns rapidly points to a cartridge malfunction as the primary cause.

Is it possible that the print head has a reversible clog? Sure, but less likely than a cartridge malfunction. A single deep clean may resolve. Continued and frequent use of the printer may overcome a reversible print head clog but it will NOT resolve a cartridge ink flow problem. Thorough flushing and soaking may resolve if this is a reversible print head nozzle(s) clog -- which I doubt in the first place.

Is it possible that there is an intermittent issue of the electronic/electrical systems? Unlikely, but you can clean the electrical contacts on the print head and the printer's print head carriage with isopropyl alcohol and a lint free cloth or use a soft pencil eraser.

Could this be an issue with the purge system? Possible but not likely as only one cartridge is affected (so far).

As the cartridge appears the most likely culprit from the information you have provided, the recommendation is to try another Magenta, preferably a new, never opened, OEM cartridge. If you refilled then a thorough water flushing at your sink would also be a potential solution.

 

[snowmexican]

I have not always been using OEM inks (sadly) or even refilling, this was my first "high end" printer and didn't realize that the inks could cause problems with the actual print head vs just print quality.
I have now researched and learned more about these higher-end printers and the care needed for a print head.

I have been using 3rd party inks for about a year now so I'm not sure if that has done some damage to the printhead or not.
I have been having quite a few issues with the printer (probably after switching the 3rd party inks)
The main problem has been constant "Clogging" I say clogging, but I recently read/heard that full nozzle clogs are very unlikely and I was getting almost all colours clogging at least twice a month.
I had just assumed it was because its winter where I am not and the relative humidity is quite low indoors atm (usually around 20%)
I would run several cleaning cycles and a few deep clean over the course of a day or two and that would fix it.

More recently I've been taking the printhead out to soak when this would occur and I would then run distilled water through each channel until clear, then reinstall, and it would normally clear up.

I just got the OEM inks today, so I took the print head out and let it soak for a few hours, rinsed out each channel and reinstalled, all the inks look good, except for that magenta issue. They are new to me, but I'm not sure how old they may be manufacturing wise if that plays into it. They did have quite a long shipping journey up to where I live and were probably in below-freezing temperatures for a while. They did have a few days to warm up in the warm post office.

I have been printing pretty often, as I stated before I used to have a pretty bad "clogging" or starvation or idk issue where it would seem fully clogged if I didn't use it every few days (like I could maybe leave it a day or two most before I would start losing channels) I didn't want to lose so much ink to cleaning I was printing almost every other day, either a 4*6 (had a ton of extra sheets) or a nozzle check.

The issue only seemed to come up today after cleaning the printhead and then changing to OEM cartridges. I'm not sure which of the two caused it, but I've taken the printhead out to clean several times and never had an issue like this before.

I don't have any more OEM magentas, I think I may have a 3rd party (but I don't want to use those in case they were the problem in the first place)
I ordered a refill kit from precision inks that should be here in a few days, it would take over a week to get any OEM if I order now. (I live pretty remotely so shipping takes its time)

The air vent seems to be okay, looks exactly the same as the other cartridges and the same as the previous OEM cartridges I used.

I have time if I need to do an extended soak or something (no need for the printer for a few weeks) or if I need to print any sort of test sheets or sample prints to help diagnose.

Do the cartridges and print head need some time to pull the ink through when a new cartridge is used. I noticed when I first opened the new cartridges, there was a small whitish (not pure white but lighter than the surrounding area) spot on the bottom of the new cartridges. Could this be part of it?

Thank you very much for your reply.
Let me know if I missed anything or if there are any other questions I need to answer.

 

[stratman]

Your new information rovides a better understanding of your situation.

I would run several cleaning cycles and a few deep clean over the course of a day or two and that would fix it.

Running more than 1 deep clean (or 2) in 24 hours may overheat and irreparably harm your print head. All cleaning cycles should be used sparingly. Sometimes it is best to run a regular cleaning cycle, print a nozzle check, then if still bad then either (A) run a second regular cleaning cycle and print a nozzle check or (B) let the printer sit over night. Clogs may dissolve in the fresh ink in the nozzles. There is not perfect method, but many of the senior forum members like to let their printers rest over night and look at the nozzle check then.

More recently I've been taking the printhead out to soak when this would occur and I would then run distilled water through each channel until clear, then reinstall, and it would normally clear up.

Be careful that the print head exterior is dry. Liquid on the PCB board and electronics can cause an irreparable electrical short.

I ordered a refill kit from precision inks that should be here in a few days,

Thoroughly flush the Magenta cartridge before refilling as discussed in my earlier post.

I have time if I need to do an extended soak or something (no need for the printer for a few weeks) or if I need to print any sort of test sheets or sample prints to help diagnose.

Do not print anything other than nozzle checks until the Magenta issue is resolved or a forum member advises differently. Canon print heads rely on the ink to cool the nozzles as they heat up the ink and spit it out onto the paper. Without the cooling ink you risk irreparably burning out nozzles.

As for flushing and soaking the print head... who knows. It might help, it might not. Depending on how long until the refill supplies come I would concentrate on trying a new Magenta (or a thoroughly flushed and refilled Magenta cartridge) first to see if that works. It's up to you what seems best to you.

Do the cartridges and print head need some time to pull the ink through when a new cartridge is used.

The printer performs a new cartridge ink purge to prime the print head. For a properly performing cartridge and print head no other action is needed to initiate the cartridge.

Hopefully a properly performing cartridge with fresh ink will cure your issue. This is why the recommendation to try a new, never opened Magenta cartridge, as this will rule out cartridge malfunction. Then you begin to look more closely at the print head.

If you try to change everything at once you won't know what the problem is and may chase your tail in circles.

Last, there is a phenomena called "Yello Gello" where refilling the OEM Yellow cartridge can/will over time create clogging in the sponge. It has been proposed that similar events may occur with Magenta, at least with a different printer model. Not saying this is your issue, but to be aware if refilling. See the following link for more:

https://www.printerknowledge.com/th...estions-on-cli-251-printers.11587/#post-97508

Let us know how things go. Good luck,

 

[snowmexican]

So the issue is still present and seems to be getting slightly worsened. It doesn't seem to get back to a state of a good nozzle check, I'll check morning and night it will still have this issue, giving it plenty of time to rest.
The black and grey got the same issue about a day or two after my first post, I didn't update because I would still need to test with new/different cartridges.

I got the precision ink refill kit and did a refill for M and BK (which now has the same issue, but seemingly more persistent, as well as GY)
I followed the refill instructions and checked for flow and both looked good before installing them and printing a nozzle check.


Could this be a purging issue as you mentioned in the first reply?
If so is there anything I can do to identify/ fix that?
I also did notice that the canon software is reporting very different usage to what my inks actually look like
for example, PC says it's almost used up, but this is what it actually looks like, barely any ink used?

Would this then be a printhead issue? is it not using the ink properly? is it partly clogged?
I've done a printhead soak in the past, so I'm not sure what the issue will be. Longer soaks?
Damaged?

Thank you for taking the time to help, it is really appreciated.

 

[The Hat]

Could this be a purging issue as you mentioned in the first reply?

Looking at the pic of your Cyan blue cart, I can see its filled all wrong, 1/ the reservoir is filled to over-full, 2/ the sponge side looks to have bubbles in the top part, 3/ the reason why you’re getting odd ink monitoring levels is because you didn’t reset the chips..

Finally it looks very much to me that you have the same blue ink in both of your cyan carts and also the same issue with the magenta carts too, and if you’re having ink flow problems its most likely you didn’t fill the cart at low ink, but waited till they were empty..

I’d suggest you go back to the start again and learn the proper procedures for refilling these cart properly, because most of your problems seemed to be related to ink starvation issues, as for the missing lines in the magenta nozzle check, it may come back, IF you install a proper known working magenta cartridge and not one you have refilled yourself..

 

[snowmexican]

Sorry if I wasn't so clear, the only carts that I had refilled were the magenta and the black.
The cart in the picture is a stock, OEM cart from canon, so no refilling for these other colours.

I've never refilled before, but I did use 3rd party inks (unfortunately I didn't realize they could end up causing issues that would damage the printer, once I only recently found that out)

I was using OEM magenta when this issue first showed, and the other cart I used was a refilled magenta (refilled a Canon cart that was flushed and dried)
Both still present issues?
The black nozzle check is also showing issues whether I am using the OEM cart or the one I refilled today.

 

[stratman]

I would still need to test with new/different cartridges.

My recommendation stands and includes every single color displaying problems: Try either a new never opened cartridge, preferably OEM, or, thoroughly flush and refill with fresh ink. Then try another nozzle check, scan it, crop it and post here.

At some point, since you are refilling, ALL your cartridges should be flushed or taken out of rotation and replaced.

FYI: IF you let the flushed cartridge dry completely you can have problems with ink flow, at least temporarily.

canon software is reporting very different usage to what my inks actually look like
for example, PC says it's almost used up, but this is what it actually looks like, barely any ink used?

Did you reset the chip when you refilled the cartridge? Are you using an ARC chips, third party one time chips or the Canon OEM chips that came on the cartridges?

You have a lot going on so proceeding stepwise without introducing too many new variables so we can figure out what is going on seems a reasonable approach.

 

[snowmexican]

My recommendation stands and includes every single color displaying problems: Try either a new never opened cartridge, preferably OEM, or, thoroughly flush and refill with fresh ink. Then try another nozzle check, scan it, crop it and post here.

This was another cartridge, flushed, dried, tested for flow, was getting a good flow of ink dripping with the fill plug removed.
The Magenta and Black were the only two that I replaced with refilled cartridges, and this was my first refill for both, using flushed OEM cartridges.
I attached a PDF for the nozzle checks, scanned and cropped
It seems like the issues are progressing further to the rest of the colours.
All of them have a streaking issue now.

Did you reset the chip when you refilled the cartridge? Are you using an ARC chips, third party one time chips or the Canon OEM chips that came on the cartridges?

I reset the Magenta and the Black, as those were the only ones that I refilled, the Grey I replaced with a 3rd party ink, one of the ones I had lying around to rule out any refilling errors I may have made.

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As you can see on the post before the magenta and black were reporting full (because I reset them) now they are still reporting higher than the others.
This is the pc and pm that were in the printhead (OEM ink, not refilled)
The PC is reporting low in the software while it is almost completely full.

Did you reset the chip when you refilled the cartridge? Are you using an ARC chips, third party one time chips or the Canon OEM chips that came on the cartridges?

I am using OEM chips that were on the cartridges.

I don't believe that this is a cartridge issue as 5/8 cartridges are OEM, 2/8 are refilled (and checked for good flow) and 1/8 is a 3rd party cartridge.
For there to be the same bad flow issues with all of these cartridges is very slim, especially now since the problem has progressed to all colours.
The ink is definitely not getting through the printhead because of the abundance of ink still in the carts. Is this a bad/damaged printhead, and why would it present now that I gave it OEM inks? just bad timing?

Thank you again for taking your time to help assist me with this issue, let me know whatever else I may try next

 

[stratman]

This is getting frustrating for us as I am sure it is for you. There is an abundance of information in the thread but it is not cohesive and is confusing at times. For all I know the printer or cartridges have been sitting for months to years inactive, which would be a source of problem(s). Also, I don't know your printing and refilling practices, nor do I know if we are talking the same language when you said the cartridge dripped well after refilling.

The PDF nozzle check in your last post seems to have reoccurring issues OR it might just be artifacts from scanning or image compression. The vertical black bars appear consistent but the color swaths may have some horizontal tread mark-like patterns plus or minus missing ink/nozzles.

The missing ink seems to be consistent across several of the swaths. Whether this represents a reversible clog or irreparable electronic malfunction will become clearer over time. Use of the printer may clear small clogs, though there is the risk of permanently damaging nozzles if no ink is available to cool them while printing. It is a catch 22. Maybe flushing and soaking the print head will do the job. Maybe not. Maybe it is a combination of cartridge and print head. Cannot opine until the most basic of tests are done to help rule in / rule out issues.

Concerning your refilled cartridges, it is possible to get ink into the air channel of the cartridge. This channel is used to equilibrate air pressure inside the cartridge with the outside atmosphere, If the channel is choked by ink then no air exchange and missing ink occurs when printing. Either blowing into the top of the cartridge where the vent hole is OR draining, flushing and refilling the cartridge will resolve the issue.

While I doubt this is an issue, you may also perform a test of your purge system if you would like. See the following link. Water may be used. Report your findings.

https://www.printerknowledge.com/threads/urgent-help-canon-ip4920.7972/page-4#post-66333

Frankly, there is a lot going on and information is spread out and a bit confusing. Even so, my recommendation STILL stands that you use new cartridges in order to remove any confusion or confounding ancillary issue. You want the fewest variables potentially creating a misleading diagnosis. ANY cartridge that has an issue should be replaced with a new cartridge, perform a nozzle check and post here. Specific things are asked of you because each of us have a method to our diagnosis algorthm. At this point, starting with the cartridges is the best first choice since we can then cross off cartridge malfunction and go on to the next area.

Worst case scenario is you need a new print head.