A simple spreadsheet

Ok,
The Pro 100 has been up and running for about a month. All is well. I just got my refill kit from Precision Color. I have a full set of extra OEM carts.
I made a little spreadsheet to keep right under my nose when I do my cartridge swapping and refilling. Hopefully I can avoid making an easy but costly mistake by doing one thing at a time , and checking off as I go. This will help me keep track of usage as well.
Dan

Actually I did the same thing with both my 9000 and Pro-100

The problem with tabulating the Pro-100 usage is that best practice dictates swapping ALL carts when the lowest cart give a low ink warning.

This is when the lowest cart has the clear section empty, but some ink remains in the sponge. At the same time the least used cart may have full sponges and at least 50% remaining in the clear section.

Consequently it is very difficult to precisely calculate ink usage. Not to mention that the retention of ink in the sponges varies as the number of fillings without a purge increases. Changing one of the carts may be because close to 14ml has been used and another cart in the same swap has used only 7ml of ink.

Of course this was before I had use of a gram scale, which I purchased upon acquisition of my 3880, but decided not to restart my spread sheet analyses.

One thing that is clear with only rudimentary data is that the economy on refilling is undisputed. Even using the better quality third party ink-sets I am thousands of dollars ahead on my pro-100 even after buying a spare head as a reserve.

In case this doesn`t sound credible I have close to 3,000 prints on my Pro-100 and calculated as follows: Assuming each sheet averages A4 size at 1ml per sheet (Inks Stained fingers calculation) we have 3,000ml used. Average retail price OEM ML Canadian dollars $1.35

Even if you allow a 25% fudge factor due to inaccuracy of my average size guess, the savings are impressive.


rs

Roy,
I'm actually less concerned with accurate ink volume usage records than I am with remembering to reset chips, and putting the right ink in the right cart, and the right cart in the right place. I will be swapping our full sets, as many have suggested.
Dan

dannno said:

Roy,
I'm actually less concerned with accurate ink volume usage records than I am with remembering to reset chips, and putting the right ink in the right cart, and the right cart in the right place. I will be swapping our full sets, as many have suggested.
Dan

Click to expand...

The way to not make any mistakes is not to over complicated your refilling technique, start slowly by arranging first your ink bottles in the same order as the carts are in your printer.

Do exactly the same with the replacement carts that you intend putting into the printer, now swap out each cart in turn replacing colour for colour till you have completed the set.

Your printer will now do a wash and shave and be ready to accept the next print job, so when you have the time, there’s no hurry, you first need to reset each of the extracted carts in turn and then fit the orange clip back onto the bottom, this is regardless of how full each cart looks.

Then all that remains to do is to top up each cart in turn from left to right, matching each cart with the ink bottle in front of it, within a short while you should have this routine down to precision.

But please remember when you undertake your refilling, Patients should be your constant companion, its more pleasurable when you share your chore, then you’re not talking to yourself.

Happy Refilling...

At the office, I'm just going to swap out the carts, putting a new clip on each one that I remove. I'll take those home and refill systematically in my basement. I used to refill Hp carts- I expect these to be easier, and more consistent.

This chart could keep some valuable information... when you change out the entire set, write down the weight of each cart before you refill it.

William, That's a great idea.

I revised, made 2 columns for each cart. Now I can record pre-fill and filled weights.

Now all you have to do is make one for the Pro-1 and Pro-10 and we're all set.

William,
Send me the cart colors, and order they insert in machine from left to right, and I'll take a run at it in my spare time.
Dan