Canon Pixma Pro1 B500 fault

Hi everyone, new to the forum, so have patience
I have a huge problem: I bought a second hand PixmaPro 1 about 1.5 years ago. Lived in the middle east at the time, soon enough the ink was running out. Local Canon shop asked a serious fortune for replacement ink, so I ordered ink from e bay, Of course: Cartridges didn't t really work, got B 500 fault, dragged the printer to the Canon shop, laughing staff, paid for a new set (as the printer was more or less only half a year old, guarantee etc etc etc etc). Now back home in New Zealand, ink ran out. Ordered cartridges from Jose and ink from precision colours, all very reasonable. When I did the second refill I must have punched the CO pouch somehow, ink all over the print. Contacted Jose, he advised me to check the cartridge, did that, replaced the cartridge with (my mistake) one of the ones I bought the first time : B500 (aaaarrrrgg). Realised it (with the help of Jose again), swapped it for a proper replacement one, turned the printer on all fine, no yellow light flashing. The minute I try to print : B500 ......... is there any one out there who knows what to do (no I m not going to drive 1.5 hours to the next Canon shop etc etc etc). EXTREMLY disappointed that Canon is squeezing money out of everyone who uses their printers (ink can t be so expensive as precision colours sells the ink for 1/4 of the price and still makes a profit). THANK you !!!!! Mike

If you have not tried this yet then Google "Canon Pixma Pro 1 B500".

First hit for me was https://www.justanswer.com/printers/7q8n0-hi-error-code-b500-canon-pixma-pro-1-two-lights.html. Seems reasonable to try. Make sure you are using known working or genuine Canon OEM cartridges.

The second hit was Canon's own advice: http://ugp01.c-ij.com/ij/webmanual/ErrorCode/PRO-1 v1-1 series/EN/ERR/B500.html

Canon's guide to the flashing error lights for the Pro 1: https://support.usa.canon.com/kb/index?page=content&id=ART151139

Interestingly, the following Canon web site Error Code list did not return anything for B500 but did for 5B00: https://www.canon-europe.com/support/consumer_products/product_ranges/printers/pixma/error_codes/

Hi Stratman, thanks for the reply, tried already the turn off / turns on, cleaned the print head and the nozzles etc etc, no success. As I said the repiner doesn't t show any sign of fault once I have removed the cartridges and then put them back, turn it on and it s fine. The minute I hit the print button on my computer the yellow / orange light instantly flashed 8 times. I m pretty sure that the ink waste tank / pad is n t full as I have used only 2 set of cartridges up to now and the ink waste tank was cleaned by Canon in the Middle East in the first place. Only one set used since, so I think it has more to do with the wrong cartridge I inserted by mistake.... but how to get rid of the fault ? Thanks Mike

Hi MikeBapu and welcome to the forum with patience and patents.

First off sorry for all the problem your having your printer, but once you switched to compatible carts, you fell right into the hands of Canon Service.

They have seen your problem numerous times before, so they were entitled to laugh at the situation you had found yourself into, the Pro 1 is a very intelligent printer, as you are now finding out, O’ and your guarantee was next to useless in this situation.

On refilling your OEM cartridges, you obviously didn’t follow the proper refilling procedure which ended up with a major leaking problem, and I’m surprised you did see the leakage before reusing the cart, it would have been dripping out all over the place.

Contacting Jose was not the right thing to do, and a bit unfair to be putting him into that situation, because Joes may be good on print colour issues, but he’s not very experienced or knowledgeable with solving printer problems.

Your practical knowledge and ability with inkjet printers are very limited, hence why the litany of mistakes and errors are mounting up and not down, and your endeavours to save money are costing you countless more money because of this and way more than it should.

It hard to know where to begin to solve your printer problems because it’s the mistakes you are constantly making that is causing these problems to mount up, there is a possibility that your Waste ink cartridge is full because Canon service didn’t change it, otherwise it would have cost you over $600 to get your printer back.

I reckon the Waste ink cartridge is ok and your problem is the ink that leaked into the printer causing this B500 error to appear, so unfortunately, you’re going to have to clean all the leaked ink out from around and within the ink storage area.

Turning the power off on your printer does not “Turn it off “it only puts the printer into suspend mode, you’ll need to un plug the printer from the power to put it to sleep, in any hope of a reset, but before working on it please unplug it first.

First turn on the printer and when it allows you to open the ink cartridge doors, do so and then unplug from the wall, then remove all the cartridges on that side and this should give you access to and enable you to clean all the cartridge bays one by one with loads of alcohol.

If you can put the alcohol into a spray bottle the better and use a paint brush, paper cloths and QTips to wet down and wipe the whole area, the more the merrier, and if you have the use of a pressure can of air, all the better.

leave the ink cartridge door open for several hours and only then replace the OEM cartridges, close the door and power on the printer, keep your fingers crossed and it might start to work properly once again, it will all depend on how well you cleaned up...

Thanks For your reply; I mentioned Jose because he was helpfull! My pratical knowlegde might not be enough to see all the issues coming towards me but I thought your practical knowledge would be giving me some new ideas. I have disconnected the printer from the power supply, I have cleaned the printer several times thorowly and I ll do it again to see if there s any difference. What else to do ? Is there no reset option ? Why would a printer whic his causing so many porblems (I don t seem to be the only one with the issue) get such good ratings? Only because of the print quality? Doesn t user friendliness not count . Maybe I am wrong !

MikeBapu said:

My pratical knowlegde might not be enough to see all the issues coming towards me but I thought your practical knowledge would be giving me some new ideas.

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I feel I must respond to some of the comments make about the Pro 1 in this thread, with limited knowledge of what caused the problem, we are expected to know exactly what the issue is and give an instant fix when all the facts were not presented. (Edited version).

MikeBapu said:

Why would a printer whic his causing so many porblems (I don t seem to be the only one with the issue) get such good ratings?

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It always seems to be the same when a user Fubars their printer and then blames Canon for making such a lemon, but the printer didn’t cause the original problem, so why then bad mouth it for their lack of operational experience...

Inwon t reply to your insults any more .. .have a nice life ...

Edit by Moderator:
Now that put me in my place, so much for trying to help @MikeBapu..

This is a forum with volunteers, not the Canon maintenance service .

MikeBapu said:

Ordered cartridges from Jose

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I didn't know Joe is a vendor of printer supplies. Is there a web site or was this a one-off sale of unwanted supplies?

stratman said:

I didn't know Joe is a vendor of printer supplies. Is there a web site or was this a one-off sale of unwanted supplies?

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Don't you watch Joe's cosy chats on YouTube ?
As I understand he has a supply of empty Pro-1 carts and fits them with one-time chips.
IMO the revenues from this and YouTube fees serve to cover his purchases of all the hardware and inks he tests.
His information is much appreciated.