What is inside the Pixma Print Head?

[canonfodder]

Has anyone cut open a Pixma series print head?

I would like to know what is inside.

Most all on this forum know that there are print head input ports where the cartridge exit ports connect.

On a new or clean print head it is easy to see that the input ports have an extremely fine screen that comes in contact with the filter-like material that is present in a cartridge's exit port.

I would like to know what else is down inside. I imagine that there is a wick-like material behind that screen, but has anyone looked? If I had a bad print head I would cut it open and see just what is in there. I would really like to know just how the rest of the ink path is constructed. I don't want to build any print heads. I do want to try to understand just how the ink is managed.

Has anyone seen an authoritative discussion and drawings of the print head insides?

I have some spare print heads, but I don't have a BAD print head and I hesitate to cut open a $35 head that still works.

 

[jflan]

Here is just a small portion of this very informative thread:
http://www.nifty-stuff.com/forum/viewtopic.php?id=241&p=11

 

[canonfodder]

jflan,

Thanks for that link. Lots of information there.

I still want to know just what one would see if the print head's input port were opened up, and whether the path from there on down is filled with a wick material, or perhaps is just an open passageway.

The pictures that mikling posted showed that in the head he opened up, there were open passageways right down at the point where ink is distributed to the sets of individual pumps.

I am trying to understand just what the ink goes through as it is pulled toward the pumps. I understand that a priming vacuum is pulled to bring ink from a just installed cartridge on down to the business end of the print head. I assume that after that, the printing pumps produce the pull to bring more ink down as it is consumed. Perhaps someone knows and can tell me exactly how that part of the printing system functions.

I plan to do some serious patent searching to see if anything can be learned there. That is a large task, of course. Canon has at least 1600 patents related to print heads and "liquid distribution for recording".