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#1: Research: Creating a Canon iP4200 CIS.. Author: Martin, Location: South Yorkshire, UK

Posted: Wed Jan 18, 2006 7:39 pm
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As anyone who's a Canon user will know the new Pixma iP4200 model uses chipped cartridges which use much the same sort of technology as Epson to check their ink levels.

Without getting into the good/bad off this change, the system can be refilled but the cartridge will note that any attempt to use it beyond it's declared "empty" level will result in the ink status monitor being disabled and the printer is marked (presumably in a flash rom chip) as being out of warranty.

You're warned about all of this though so don't panic Smile

Now, for inkcart refillers this is a nightmare as the ink level is essential to ensuring you can still print and to give you an indication of when the cart is empty so you don't burn out your print head. So, the only way to be sure is to pull out the carts and look... Wasteful and a major irritation.

.. BUT...

... for CIS users it doesn't matter at all.. You can tell what level your ink is by looking at the levels in the reservoirs/bottles.

So... at some point in the not too distant future I'm going to be playing with the iP4200 and some empty cartridges to see if a CIS system with this printer is feasible or not.

I'll keep you posted.

#2: Author: Mooseman,

Posted: Thu Jan 19, 2006 1:24 am
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I'm just wondering if the system they use will be the same as the Newer Epsons (i.e R220) that recognizes non-Epson chips and refuse to print? Will this also void the warranty if you attempt this?

And wasn't there some court ruling (in the US, of course) that manufacturers cannot force a buyer of a printer to buy their ink? I'm pretty sure there was a ruling in the late 90's where Epson (of course!) had a clause in their warranty that if you use non-Epson ink that it would void the warranty. It's like a car manufacturer forcing you to use their oil. As long as it's compatible, they can't do that.

Now, if the iP4200 will accept non-Canon carts, then this will not be an issue for a CIS since the auto-resetting chip would not allow the printer to go to empty. As far as the refilling crowd is concerned, a chip resetter should be available fairly soon. Heck, Best Buy and Staples now have them for Epson chips right next to the Epson carts and refill kits. Did a quick Google and eBay search and I couldn't find any.

Another thought... what about a hacked version of the Canon software? Sorta like the SSC Service Utility for Epsons? There's something to get those Russian programmers going!

Mooseman

#3: Author: Martin, Location: South Yorkshire, UK

Posted: Thu Jan 19, 2006 10:21 am
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Mooseman wrote:
I'm just wondering if the system they use will be the same as the Newer Epsons (i.e R220) that recognizes non-Epson chips and refuse to print? Will this also void the warranty if you attempt this?

To be honest I'm working on the principal that installing a CIS is going to cause the warranty to be voided anyway so I'm not expecting any help. Instead I'm going to see about obtaining the service manual so I can take care of the obvious issues like waste pads, etc... myself.

From what I've heard about the new Canon carts, the printer gives you three chances to confirm that you want to continue using a cart that the chip says is empty, after which it turns off the ink level indication and flash updates the printer to say that you've confirmed your decision and understand your warranty is now void.

Quote:
And wasn't there some court ruling (in the US, of course) that manufacturers cannot force a buyer of a printer to buy their ink? I'm pretty sure there was a ruling in the late 90's where Epson (of course!) had a clause in their warranty that if you use non-Epson ink that it would void the warranty. It's like a car manufacturer forcing you to use their oil. As long as it's compatible, they can't do that.

There was I believe but in this instance I think the fact that you are agreeing to a set of terms and conditions will weight heavily in Canons favour.

In fairness to Canon, there's a huge number of cheap poor quality inks that are flooding the market that, as many have found, can actively damage and clog your printer. Bearing that in mind, common sense dictates that you'd want to discourage people from using them if you are liable for repairing your printer. Lord knows there's the counter arguement that it's more a revenue protection measure and I'm sure that's more than a small element.

As an aside I do feel that people forget that they can't have their cake and eat it too. Some of the aftermarket inks are so bad the car analogy would be someone putting diesel in a petrol car because it was cheaper and still "fuel". If you were the car dealer/manufacturer, you wouldn't accept that as an excuse.

There's a lot of talk about how "Evil" Epson and Canon are regarding their use of tie ins, but from an purely engineering point of view, there's a lot of arguements for the crap ink manufacturers to be taken to task for their abuse of the market. Mislabelling and profitteering is not just the printer manufacturers domain.. lord knows anyone in the printer ink industry is well aware of that...

Anyways, to get back on track Wink

Quote:
Now, if the iP4200 will accept non-Canon carts, then this will not be an issue for a CIS since the auto-resetting chip would not allow the printer to go to empty. As far as the refilling crowd is concerned, a chip resetter should be available fairly soon. Heck, Best Buy and Staples now have them for Epson chips right next to the Epson carts and refill kits. Did a quick Google and eBay search and I couldn't find any.

The thing is... In Epsons, you need an auto-reset chip for a CIS because the printers are programmed to halt all printing unless the chip shows any useable ink volume. In these new Canons though, it seems that once you've been through the whole "I understand I'm about to commit a mortal sin" process the chip is no longer queried or relevant. Ok, so you still need to have a chip on the cart but there's no need to reset it and the CIS can continue to work. Your only concern is, like any other CIS, to keep the external bottles/reservoirs topped up.

QED no autoreset chip required or needed. The only benefit of a resettable chip would be that your printer didn't set the "warranty voided" variable in the printer and to be honest I could care less about that myself.

After-market cartridges are going to need that chip though and that's where most users will be hurting.

Quote:
Another thought... what about a hacked version of the Canon software? Sorta like the SSC Service Utility for Epsons? There's something to get those Russian programmers going!

Well the thing with this is that Canon printers have service menus that are accessible using a series of button pushes and a guide. You can usually find a guide on the net if you look long and hard enough (and are patient) so it's really not necessary unless Canon change their operating procedure.

All in all, I have to say that the newer Canon models are actually going to cause something of a surge on CIS kits for people who just don't want to be paying the OEM prices... Could be interesting.. Smile

#4: Author: ocular,

Posted: Thu Feb 09, 2006 9:36 am
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Ideally installing a CIS onto OEM cartridges before allowing them to run dry would be the way to go? If warnings via the software are initiated as the cartridge is emptied, then installing a CIS from the beginning ( and never letting it run dry) should allow warranty to continue. I suppose we don't know for sure if the warnings are initiated by ink volume usage as well?

Installing a CIS into Canon OEM cartridges is not hard.

1. Seal the exit port. Remove all the paper covering from the top of the cartridge - can be difficult to remove, I use an emery wheel on a dremel.
2. Remove the Ball plug from the hole over the non - sponge chamber and fill the hole generously with silastic making it flush with the cartridge surface. Let it set.
3. The air maze over the sponge chamber ends in a larger hole. Thread this hole to allow a right angle spigot to be screwed and glued in so that tubing can be attached ( threaded spigot and tubing available from MIS). Fill in the surrounding air maze groove with glue. (There are some nice right angled connectors with neat silastic tubing sleeves that would push straight into this hole, but I haven't been able to source them.)

There you have a converted OEM cartridge, I have done this OEM BCI 3eBLK canon cartridges but not with the IP4200 cartridges. The IP4200 cartridges look to the same except for the LED on the end.

Prime the tubing from the CIS reservoir with ink and clamp before connecting tubing to cartridge. Connect tubing to the cartridge ( that has exit port sealed) Place a small needle (25G) into the silastic plug you created to allow air to bleed from the system when the ink flows into the cartridge. Unclamp one tube at a time and with the cartridge slightly lower than the reservoir and ink will flow. When full of ink withdraw the needle from the silastic plug. Do this to fill each cartridge in turn.

Happy CISing

#5: Author: Martin, Location: South Yorkshire, UK

Posted: Thu Feb 09, 2006 11:25 am
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ocular wrote:
Ideally installing a CIS onto OEM cartridges before allowing them to run dry would be the way to go? If warnings via the software are initiated as the cartridge is emptied, then installing a CIS from the beginning ( and never letting it run dry) should allow warranty to continue. I suppose we don't know for sure if the warnings are initiated by ink volume usage as well?

This is one thing I'm unsure of to be honest and to date I've not heard anything one way or the other.

My understanding of the new Canon system was that it will still "run out" of ink whether the ink has completely gone or not. Unfortunately I can't be 100% sure because my own test iP4200 needed some work doing on it before I could even check but if, as you suggest, the chip will only mark itself as empty once the the real ink level is zero then you could well be right.

Quote:
Installing a CIS into Canon OEM cartridges is not hard.

1. Seal the exit port. Remove all the paper covering from the top of the cartridge - can be difficult to remove, I use an emery wheel on a dremel.
2. Remove the Ball plug from the hole over the non - sponge chamber and fill the hole generously with silastic making it flush with the cartridge surface. Let it set.

Yep... standard stuff.

Quote:
3. The air maze over the sponge chamber ends in a larger hole. Thread this hole to allow a right angle spigot to be screwed and glued in so that tubing can be attached ( threaded spigot and tubing available from MIS). Fill in the surrounding air maze groove with glue. (There are some nice right angled connectors with neat silastic tubing sleeves that would push straight into this hole, but I haven't been able to source them.)

You might want to try ark-plas here: http://www.ark-plas.com/products/product.asp?classID=4

They only do stuff in bulk but I suspect they can help at least provide some samples for testing and/or help with finding the bit you've found elsewhere.

Quote:
There you have a converted OEM cartridge, I have done this OEM BCI 3eBLK canon cartridges but not with the IP4200 cartridges. The IP4200 cartridges look to the same except for the LED on the end.

Makes sense I guess...

Quote:
Prime the tubing from the CIS reservoir with ink and clamp before connecting tubing to cartridge. Connect tubing to the cartridge ( that has exit port sealed) Place a small needle (25G) into the silastic plug you created to allow air to bleed from the system when the ink flows into the cartridge. Unclamp one tube at a time and with the cartridge slightly lower than the reservoir and ink will flow. When full of ink withdraw the needle from the silastic plug. Do this to fill each cartridge in turn.

Now that's a novel approach... Until now I'd always done it using the Vaccum pump I got from MIS but this sounds like it could be a whole lot easier...

Quote:
Happy CISing

Thanks for the input Osage... Really useful stuff... I'll let you know when I finally get some answers to the questions above in a couple of weeks time.

Cheers

#6: Author: Martin, Location: South Yorkshire, UK

Posted: Wed Jun 07, 2006 12:29 pm
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ocular wrote:
Ideally installing a CIS onto OEM cartridges before allowing them to run dry would be the way to go? If warnings via the software are initiated as the cartridge is emptied, then installing a CIS from the beginning ( and never letting it run dry) should allow warranty to continue. I suppose we don't know for sure if the warnings are initiated by ink volume usage as well?

I'd forgotten to update this thread but I can now confirm that the Canon chipped system uses a belt and braces approach to their new cartridges.

The prism is still very much alive and in use but now it acts more as a fallback to detect if a cartridge loses or uses ink faster than expected (ie: empties due to an accident) or if you've refilled it after it's declared itself empty.

The chip is a cunning piece of technological highway robbery as it marks the cartridge as empty either when the prism indicates it's empty or when the printer has fired off a set number of nozzle jets..

As a result you can't fool the printer into thinking it's always full because the chip is keeping an eye on what it expects the cartridge ink levels to do and you still get the warranty warning.

More worrying there's an unconfirmed report that you can't disable all five cartridges (ie: refill them all) without the printer throwing a fit and refusing to print. This is still very much unconfirmed so I've queried Canon directly and have a printer nearing the point where all 5 cartridges will be "empty".. We'll see what happens.

In other news, I've recently uploaded a bunch of pictures taken of my second iP4200 CIS kit attempt (the first is working fine but is up on a shelf) and popped them here

I'm waiting on some parts due to arrive in the next week until I create yet another version and then I'll create a DIY guide to creating a CIS for the iP4200 and possibly another for modifying the printer to use an external waste ink tank.

#7: Author: cdninkjetsupply, Location: Toronto, Canada

Posted: Wed Jun 21, 2006 6:14 pm
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I do have CIS units available for the Epson R220, the printer verifies the chip the same way as the R200, as far as I am able to tell, it that the chip is valid by verification against a different check digit in the epson chip code from the 1st generation R-series.
What this means that unless the coding in your aftermarket chip is the exact same as the epson OEM cartridge (equalling almost instant intellectual property theft) an ARC (Auto resetting chip) that works in the R200/R300 will not work in the R220/R320.
This can be fixed very easily through rechipping your R200 with the newer chips, which you should be able to do for about $30.

I would not suggest using OEM cartridges in a CIS unit. The main reason that I have found has nothing to do with sponge degradation or print quality or the normal things that you hear. The erason taht I have found is that the whole unit works on the principle of a syphon. When there is a sponged cartridge, you never really create a space with vacuum inside the cartridge strong enough to cause the ink to move fromn the reservoir to the cartridge.

#8: Author: Martin, Location: South Yorkshire, UK

Posted: Wed Jun 21, 2006 8:17 pm
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cdninkjetsupply wrote:
I do have CIS units available for the Epson R220

(snip)

Not wishing to detract from the points you made re: the chips and possible intellectual property theft (which are relevant) but this thread is about the Canon iP4200.. not the Epson R220.. Wink

#9: Author: cdninkjetsupply, Location: Toronto, Canada

Posted: Wed Jun 21, 2006 8:29 pm
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Sorry Martin, I agree that this is a canon forum and that my point was mis-placed.

I had merely been responding earlier posts from Mooseman and yourself from January - in this forum - on the R220.

#10: Author: Martin, Location: South Yorkshire, UK

Posted: Wed Jun 21, 2006 8:35 pm
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cdninkjetsupply wrote:
Sorry Martin, I agree that this is a canon forum and that my point was mis-placed.

I had merely been responding earlier posts from Mooseman and yourself from January - in this forum - on the R220.

Ah... I see... although in fairness it was a slightly tenuous link.. perhaps a quote to help with reference next time?.. Cool

As for the whole Epson R220 thing.. I missed that and whilst they did indeed change the chip in the R220 (which caused no end of problems thanks to CIS sellers assume-ing the R200 kits would work fine with the R220 without testing) it's not of the same order as the iP4200.

From what I understand the iP4200 is a whole other order of beast including 4 times the Epson clock speed, encrypted signal, small chip size, and more..

#11: Dead Link? Author: moestevens,

Posted: Tue Jul 18, 2006 5:18 am
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Martin, Tks for your time & Effort as moderator. I am considering the purchase of a new Canon 4200, but only if I have a running chance at converting it to a CIS. I tried to view the pictures of one of your conversions Hot Linked in your post of 7 Jun at 1129. I got an error. Could you check and see if it is good?

#12: Re: Dead Link? Author: Martin, Location: South Yorkshire, UK

Posted: Tue Jul 18, 2006 8:25 pm
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moestevens wrote:
Martin, Tks for your time & Effort as moderator. I am considering the purchase of a new Canon 4200, but only if I have a running chance at converting it to a CIS. I tried to view the pictures of one of your conversions Hot Linked in your post of 7 Jun at 1129. I got an error. Could you check and see if it is good?

Not sure what happened to the link (if you could find where the dead link was I'd appreciate it) but here's the current one.

http://www.continuousink.info/forum/gallery2.php?g2_itemId=85

In terms of a "How to.." I've learned a few new things about CIS's and Canons recently that mean I've a couple of things to try out to see if they fix one or two issues I've had problems with, namely keeping the tubing from dropping into the path of the carriage and jamming it.

I'll keep you posted.

#13: Author: scotsblood, Location: East Anglia, UK

Posted: Sat Dec 09, 2006 10:09 pm
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As the new owner of an ip4300 I was wondering whether there had been any real progress on a cis system for the latest pixma ranges?

I have seen a couple mentioned on ebay but cant seem to find any users to gain first hand experience.

Any news?

#14: Author: Martin, Location: South Yorkshire, UK

Posted: Sun Dec 10, 2006 6:51 pm
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scotsblood wrote:
As the new owner of an ip4300 I was wondering whether there had been any real progress on a cis system for the latest pixma ranges?

I have seen a couple mentioned on ebay but cant seem to find any users to gain first hand experience.

Any news?

I couldn't guarantee anything about the iP4300 because none have come out that were refurbs or cheap enough to warrant me buying one to play with.

What I can tell you is that right now I have managed to create a bloody good self-build system that works brilliantly and that I intend to document properly but it's likely to be in the new year and I suspect you want a pre-fab kit anyway.

I also have a CIS kit that fits the bill of a number of CIS clone resellers on eBay but because I haven't had any spare workshop space I haven't had a chance to get it setup for testing and review.

All in all I'm very aware that this really doesn't help you a lot... However I can tell you that the kit produced by MIS is a lot like my home build version. It uses the OEM cartridges, some low profile elbow joins and a very well thought out tubing pathway to do it's job. Better than my own efforts in truth Smile

You do pay through the nose but I would imagine, unless there's any nasty surprises in the firmware for the iP4300, you should be just fine.

As I said I'll be posting up some stuff in the new year about my own approach so watch this space..

#15: Author: scotsblood, Location: East Anglia, UK

Posted: Mon Jan 01, 2007 7:51 pm
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Thanks for that Martin, I imagine it'll be a while before I actually get around to setting up a cis system anyway so it may well be that your info arrives in good time.

I'll look forward to seeing it.

#16: Author: Conan,

Posted: Tue Feb 06, 2007 11:28 am
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Martin wrote:

What I can tell you is that right now I have managed to create a bloody good self-build system that works brilliantly and that I intend to document properly but it's likely to be in the new year

Hi, I stumbled on your site while searching for a DIY tutorial for a Canon CISS. I have to say: I'm really looking forward for your guide!

From the pictures provided so far I guess you system works in priciple like ocular described it before, right? (Meaning: One end of the ink tube goes into the sponge chamber of the cartidge, the other end goes into the external ink tank (which also has a vent hole and is placed so that the ink level is below the level of the print head))

#17: Author: Martin, Location: South Yorkshire, UK

Posted: Thu Feb 08, 2007 12:13 pm
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Hey Conan...

In truth when I started out it seemed that building a CIS for the Canons would be a doddle, since then I've learned the hard way that there's a number of issues with these printers that make life "interesting" to say the least.

On the up side however there's a long discussion going on over on http://www.nifty-stuff.com/forum about building the ultimate Canon CIS and it covers a lot more ground that I intended or thought was needed so it's well worth taking some time to read up on things there.

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