aab1 wrote:

Color_Workshop wrote:

Actually the blank ink problem is having to do with that most places sells this Ciss with dye black ink while the ink should be pigment.

It does not happen at all when you run it with correct kind of ink.

At least that is been my experience.

I could not get good black print until this was discovered and changed to pigment black.

/Amin

This is also true, my CIS system had dye black ink and I had this issue, I replaced the in and made several photocopies with the scanner lid open to print whole black pages to pump that junk out of the system, it's now running normally.

By the way, I noticed the original HP ink gives me dark pitch black, but even my pigment ink refill isn't as black, have you found a pigment black refill ink that's as black as HP's? Most people would probably swear the original HP black is laser toner since it's such a deep, pitch black.

Hmm.. that's interesting. I'll have to check with my ink supplier that I am indeed getting pigment ink for my HP's... I suspect that I am so I'll need to do some more checking.


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Printers: (Canon) MP500/830, MX700, iP4000/4200/4300/4500/5200, iX4000(A3) (Epson) C84/86, D88, CX6600, R285/800/1900 (HP) K550, K850, K5400, L7680

Martin wrote:

aab1 wrote:

I wanted to correct you on one thing though, you say it provides one shot pressure but that's not how it works, they way I figured it works is that each plastic "piston" that comes and press against the black buldge is spring loaded, this does that even though the printer motor pushes the pistons all the way, they will barely move at all and remain under the pressure of the spring. As the printer prints, the black buldge slowly "deflates" causing the piston to move in more and more under the pressure of the spring (against the pressure of the ink in the black buldge holding it back). Those pistons also have sensors, when it detects the piston has moved all the way out, it knows the black buldge is empty and will retract all pistons (allowing the black buldges to refill with ink) and then pushes them all back, applying a constant pressure to all 4 buldges, so there really is a constant pressure. If ever you have an old broken hp printer like these, you can try cutting one of the ink tubes going to the printheads and I'm sure the ink pump will start pumping constantly, as it only stops once the other side is also pressurized, so you'd hear the pistons move back and forth constantly while ink shoots out the tube.

Ah... I see... Ok... well I stand corrected then.. I had assumed (stupid of me) that the bulge part allowed free flow back and forth into the silver bag reservoir part of the cartridge but from what you seem to be saying there's actually a one way valve in there that allows ink to feed in to the bulb but not back into reservoir part.

Well, curiosity got the better of me and I decided to rip a couple of the cartridges apart to discover their secrets. The results were that they do indeed have a simple non-return valve in them.

Ink is pulled from the main reservoir into the bulb past a very simple non-return valve, and the bulb (which is spring loaded too) then pumps ink out of the cartridge exit port into the printer receptacle.



Naturally I've decided to take this one stage further and I'm going to take a set of exhausted cartridges and convert them so the bag is no longer used and I'll glue (sealed with epoxy resin) a modified barb fitting over the input port to the bulb then drill the cartridge outer so a tube can be fed into it and connected, thus feeding the bulb directly from the reservoirs. That should allow me to use a standard bottle reservoir system AND benefit from the pump device. Naturally I'll also swap the chips for some auto-reset versions but at a guess it should work rather nicely I'll let you know how I get on


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Printers: (Canon) MP500/830, MX700, iP4000/4200/4300/4500/5200, iX4000(A3) (Epson) C84/86, D88, CX6600, R285/800/1900 (HP) K550, K850, K5400, L7680

Sounds great, I never even opened a cartridge (I opened the print heads though). Could you post pictures of how and where you connect the tube bypassing the ink bag?

Thanks

aab1 wrote:

Sounds great, I never even opened a cartridge (I opened the print heads though). Could you post pictures of how and where you connect the tube bypassing the ink bag?

I'll take some over the next few days as I'm repeating the process now.

One thing to note... I've had this modified system on my cartridge now for over a week and I'm still seeing that initial lack of ink band on the first page. In desperation I've opted to purchase a completely different ink from an OCP reseller here in the UK to see if that resolves the issue. Given that I've completely rejigged the system to use the same pressure as applied by this system I'm getting a tad bemused as to other possible causes.. I'll keep you posted.


Oh and btw... have you folks found a reliable source of auto-reset chips for the L7000 series of printer? All the ones I have crap out on the black cartridge which is less than ideal.


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Printers: (Canon) MP500/830, MX700, iP4000/4200/4300/4500/5200, iX4000(A3) (Epson) C84/86, D88, CX6600, R285/800/1900 (HP) K550, K850, K5400, L7680

I got the auto reset chips that came with my pre built CIS system, they seem ok but do have an occasional glitch sometimes.

I also had the black issue for a few weeks, if you have ink to waste, do 25-100 photocopies with the scanner lid open to print many black pages, this should get the old dye based ink out and get the pigment ink in (this is of course assuming you have replaced the incompatible dye ink with pigment ink). After I printed a few black pages a day for 1-2 weeks, it finally went away. This may be due to incompatible (non pigment) ink in the printhead or air bubbles. If you're sure you're now using compatible ink, you can always replace the printhead, but mine came back to life after a while.

aab1 wrote:

I got the auto reset chips that came with my pre built CIS system, they seem ok but do have an occasional glitch sometimes.

Yeah, unfortunately "glitches" aren't really acceptable when I'm putting them into systems for other users to be using. I guess I'll have to keep looking.

Quote:

I also had the black issue for a few weeks, if you have ink to waste, do 25-100 photocopies with the scanner lid open to print many black pages, this should get the old dye based ink out and get the pigment ink in (this is of course assuming you have replaced the incompatible dye ink with pigment ink). After I printed a few black pages a day for 1-2 weeks, it finally went away. This may be due to incompatible (non pigment) ink in the printhead or air bubbles. If you're sure you're now using compatible ink, you can always replace the printhead, but mine came back to life after a while.

I've since confirmed that the ink is indeed pigment based so I've opted to order in some OCP ink in the hope that it may not show the same symptoms. I've tried running a series of purges in black and that has the desired effect but only in the short term so I'm guessing that there may now be air in there.. Problem is there there's no way (that I know of) to purge these print heads of air bubbles manually so I'm not entirely sure how I'm going to manage this.

Either way we'll see what happens when this OCP ink arrives and if it's more compatible... Time will tell...


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Printers: (Canon) MP500/830, MX700, iP4000/4200/4300/4500/5200, iX4000(A3) (Epson) C84/86, D88, CX6600, R285/800/1900 (HP) K550, K850, K5400, L7680

I bought a CISS from ebay. Installed fine but soon got an error message that it had consumed all the BLK ink that was originally installed ( I never installed the starter cartridges went directly to the CISS). The documentation shows that the reset chip should reset the ink levels but I can not get it to do it even after powering off and back on.

When restarting you do get the not an HP cartridge and it will invalidate your warrenty stuff but there is a new message that says that since this is not a real HP cartridge we will not report ink levels. So even though it does not seem to affect anything it looks like the system will always report the ink levels are unknow.

Has anyone else seen this? Is there a work around ? If I were to guess it is an HP firmware update to discourage anyone from not using an HP cartridge and make it a pain for anyone that doesll

KRKAci wrote:

I bought a CISS from ebay. Installed fine but soon got an error message that it had consumed all the BLK ink that was originally installed ( I never installed the starter cartridges went directly to the CISS). The documentation shows that the reset chip should reset the ink levels but I can not get it to do it even after powering off and back on.

When restarting you do get the not an HP cartridge and it will invalidate your warrenty stuff but there is a new message that says that since this is not a real HP cartridge we will not report ink levels. So even though it does not seem to affect anything it looks like the system will always report the ink levels are unknow.

Has anyone else seen this? Is there a work around ? If I were to guess it is an HP firmware update to discourage anyone from not using an HP cartridge and make it a pain for anyone that doesll

This is exactly the same behaviour I see from the supposedly K5400 and L7X80 printer compatible Auto Reset Chips (ARC) for that model. So far I've been completely unable to locate or identify any suppliers for properly compatible printers and the suppliers I have talked to have gotten very quiet very quickly after an initial report or two.

The good news is that the black will run out and you lose the warranty but then amazingly when one of the other inks runs out it'll reset ALL of the others too (including the black) so you get your ink monitoring back again. Of course the point is moot when you have a CIS setup but for anyone using these chips in refillable cartridges (non-CIS) you'll need to carry out regular checks of the ink in the cartridges to be sure nothing has run out.


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Printers: (Canon) MP500/830, MX700, iP4000/4200/4300/4500/5200, iX4000(A3) (Epson) C84/86, D88, CX6600, R285/800/1900 (HP) K550, K850, K5400, L7680

aab1 wrote:

Sounds great, I never even opened a cartridge (I opened the print heads though). Could you post pictures of how and where you connect the tube bypassing the ink bag?

Finally got around to taking some pictures...
http://www.continuousink.info/forum/gallery2.php?g2_itemId=370

It doesn't show how I did the actual glueing of the tube fitting but basically that should give you plenty to be going on.. All you need to do is find a way to attach a tube to that hole so ink can flow into it directly... I stripped back the bag completely to give me a clear space to work in and it helps to remove any excess ink left around.

I'll take some pictures of the fitting I used and how I glued it sometime soon when I get to that bit, later in the week.


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Printers: (Canon) MP500/830, MX700, iP4000/4200/4300/4500/5200, iX4000(A3) (Epson) C84/86, D88, CX6600, R285/800/1900 (HP) K550, K850, K5400, L7680

No pictures yet but a few tips for anyone else looking to follow in my footsteps and modify some OEM cartridges.

1. Make sure you remove the silver and plastic bag material from around the bulb inflow hole (being careful not to pierce or remove the material around the hole as noted here).
This is necessary to allow any glue to set properly as excess bag material can create a channel for ink to cause an air leak.

2. Avoid brittle epoxy resin glues to seal around the tube fitting as they will break very easily. I've found that a flexible epoxy adhesive works best after much experimentation.


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Printers: (Canon) MP500/830, MX700, iP4000/4200/4300/4500/5200, iX4000(A3) (Epson) C84/86, D88, CX6600, R285/800/1900 (HP) K550, K850, K5400, L7680